One of the perils from stand-up news reports is the potential for badly-behaving passersby, whether that’s with actual physical contact on a reporter or with offensive chants.
The latest case of some poor behavior came from a report on Philadelphia ABC affiliate WPVI on the Ocean City, New Jersey (around an hour away from Philadelphia) boardwalk’s reopening plans, which saw a jogging passerby moon the camera. But the camera operator had a smart response, zooming in on the guy after he pulled up his pants and was walking away.
Here’s that clip, via Dan McQuade:
https://twitter.com/dhm/status/1394779204617752576?s=21
This is interesting for a couple reasons. For one, the way it’s done doesn’t really detract from the intended story. The reporter’s able to carry on with her commentary, and this pan fits with the “if you take a look down the boardwalk” line. Of course, it makes sense that that led into shots of passersby. If you didn’t see the mooning in the first few seconds here, you might not notice anything odd about the follow-up shot.
But zooming in on this guy in particular gives a better look at him and the people he’s with. And while identification still might be hard (no faces are visible), the zoom-in makes it more possible than it would have been just from his run-by mooning. So maybe this leads to some consequences for him, and maybe it sends a message to others not to do this.
[Dan McQuade on Twitter]
