Results tagged “camera”

Call it a comeback. Following the announcement that Polaroid cameras and film would be gone forever and ever and never return; and following every hipster in town eating up the film on eBay to document their party nights ever-so-nostalgically; and following Urban Outfitters temporarily stocking them... Polaroid is returning! Cameras and film will be on sale by mid-2010, or you can try to buy this special kit on the 16th for the not-so-old-timey price of $430.

During his first day on the job, new MTA CEO Jay Walder announced a plan to install cameras on the front of city buses to take photos of any vehicles obstructing bus lanes. Like the city's red-light cameras, tickets will be issued automatically. Walder insists the innovation drastically improved the on-time performance of buses in London, where Walder worked before taking over the MTA. In February, the DOT began video surveillance of the "high-visibility" terra cotta-colored express-bus lanes on 34th Streets, but this would be the first time buses were used for enforcement.

Animal's Bucky Turco has talked about his 9/11 story before, and today he's also posted video to go along with it. He recalls, "it was 8:45 p.m. or so, the night of 9/11, and Diane Sawyer taps me on the shoulder. I’m standing in front of Pace University, and I guess she saw the shitty camcorder I’m holding. Diane asks me to join her film crew; there’s evidently a 'media blackout' around Ground Zero, and they need some guerrilla camera work. They give me a paper towel roll to conceal the camera, and I tuck it under my arm and basically shoot from the hip." She tells her unofficial cameraman: “Do your best. I’m walking away to distract attention from you. Just keep shooting everything you can shoot.”

At the end of March, a prominent Upper East Side psychologist was arrested after a patient discovered a surveillance camera inside a lightbulb in the bathroom. But earlier this month prosecutors dropped the felony charge of unlawful surveillance against Dr. Robert Reiner, an NYU psychologist who has appeared as a medical expert on MTV and talk shows. It turns out that the camera, which was not wired to a monitor, was unwittingly put in the outlet by a contractor Reiner hired to do some work at the office; Reiner insists he used it at his Westchester home to monitor his kids on the trampoline, and that he brought the inoperative camera into work because he needed the code number on the camera to order a new one.

The DOT is beginning video surveillance of the "high-visibility" terra cotta-colored express-bus lanes on 34th Street to keep cab drivers in check. Taxis are permitted to enter the bus lanes only to make the next right turn or to "expeditiously" pick up and drop off passengers, but officials think many cabbies have been using them as their own personal express lanes. As part of a six month trial, two cameras are being installed along the bus lane at 34th Street between Park and Madison, and four others will subsequently be installed along the route. Because the city is partnering with the Taxi and Limousine Commission and using the cameras to exclusively punish taxi drivers, the DOT says they don't need legislative approval. According to a press release, the city is pursuing state legislation to allow the use of bus lane cameras to punish all drivers who encroach on bus lanes. But for now the DOT will work with the TLC to enforce the traffic law, and cabbies caught driving in the terra cotta face fines up to $150.

While the MTA is moving forward on installing partitions to protect bus drivers from stabbers and biters, officials have also assigned camera-equipped buses to the Brooklyn route where a driver was killed in December. But Brooklyn's gain is apparently Manhattan's loss; "Tito" at the Flatbush depot tells the Post that 30 of the special buses were transferred out of Manhattan soon after the fatality. They come equipped with six to seven cameras that view the inside and outside of the vehicle. The MTA refused to comment on the security upgrade, but one driver says, "I like knowing that if something happens, it'll be recorded." Plus it should yield some amusing videos of people frantically running to catch the bus.

Some cab drivers are worried about a pilot program to install digital cameras on the outsides of their vehicles in order to monitor their driving. The city is planning to install the cameras on at least 20 vehicles as part of a pilot program, and Matthew Daus at the Taxi and Limousine Commission says, "This technology is being used effectively throughout the for-hire vehicle industry, and it is saving them considerable amounts of money on their insurance costs." EmpireCLS, the country's largest luxury car chauffeur company, has reduced payout costs for accidents by more than $500,000 since installing the cameras. Some yellow cabs already have cameras pointed toward the interior to deter crime, but Bhairavi Desai, president of the Taxi Worker's Alliance, hates the idea of exterior cameras. He tells the Daily News, "This would absolutely be an invasion of privacy. It's intrusive."

A White Plains man used a remote access program on his laptop to monitor the suspect who stole it, resulting in his arrest last week. The laptop was stolen on September 4th after Jose Caceres left it on top of his car while he carried stuff into his home. Using the remote tracking, Caceres was able to monitor the suspect's internet use, which he says primarily consisted of studying the remarkable migratory patterns of the Black-tailed Godwit. Kidding—it was porn, all porn. When the suspect, 34-year-old Gabriel Mejia of White Plains, typed in his home address to replenish his porn supply, Caceres tipped off police, who arrested Mejia just hours later. The sting is reminiscent of last May's bust of two thieves in Westchester, which took place after the owner remotely used the camera in her computer to photograph the suspects.

A Westchester woman who had her laptop stolen didn’t even bother with old fashioned signs like the one pictured here – instead she remotely used the camera in her computer to photograph the culprits. The laptop was stolen from her apartment on April 27th along with $5,000 worth of other electronics.

In addition to taking your money, an increasing number restaurants are also taking video of your dining experience, at least according to the Post’s trend-spotting Carla Spartos. She notes five Manhattan restaurants that use closed-circuit video cameras to record customers in their dining rooms: Boqueria, the four star Daniel, Dos Caminos, Philippe, and Momofuku Noodle Bar.