National Trust Properties

Only yesterday I was reading about a fairly recent protest in London organised by photographers in suport of our right to take photos in public places. I understand the worries about terrorism but if I was a terrorist and wanted to take images of target sites I dont think I would do it by lugging around a camera and possibly several lenses and a tripod. Just a trawl of the internet will provide information on all kinds of discrete photographic gear which is either almost invisible to the naked eye or is disguised as something else entirely. To my mind this is just another incidence of Britsh Law gone mad.

Now that we can sell images on PoE, the question of images taken on NT properties should be considered. The official NT line is that commercial photography (i.e. offering images for sale) requires their permission. Therefore I have been careful to ensure that any image I have uploaded to PoE of an NT location which was taken on NT property is not offered for sale.

However, if an image is taken of  an NT property, but from a location which is not on NT land (e.g. a telephoto shot from public land), do the same restrictions apply? My feeling is that they do not. An example is a recent picture I took of Greys Court in Oxfordshire, which was taken using a telephoto lens from a public footpath. Any opinions from our knowledgeable members on the legal issues here would be welcomed.

Picture by Edward Lever

As far as my understanding goes, if you are standing on 'public' property you should be OK, but I am not 100% on that. But certainly a very important issue for anyone here  wishing to sell images.

Hypothetical situation ...You are standing on a public right of way, but leaning over the fence of a 'private' property in order to improve your image compostion, and avoid spurious elements such as branches and undergrowth, your camera would then theoretically be within the boundaries of that private property ! ! ! Just a thought, altough it would take a lot of proving . . . .