Do you know this guy?
If you do, can you please tell him to return the gear he stole from a local Toronto photography rental shop? This poser-hoser somehow claimed he was picking up equipment for Matt Barnes some other photographer from Westside. But he wasn’t, he was picking it up for himself. Seriously, if you know this guy, call the police.
Bad move.
*Update: the guys been found and presumably charged.
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
Will keep an eye out. I’ll give him points for brazenness, though.
How did he know who to mention?
That’s messed up, I hope this jerk gets busted soon and hasn’t sold off the stolen gear.
As for knowing who to mention I’m guessing he researched a little bit, Matt is a pretty predominant name in Toronto photo world.
That’s horrible, and unfortunate for everyone involved. Hopefully he will be caught, that’s a pretty good photograph. Will this be on the local news tonight?
On another note, I’ve sent assistants to pick up gear for me and no one asks questions – perhaps it’s time for Vistek to start asking for a business card or a visa with the account holders name on it as ID? Just another hassle, but maybe that will stop this sort of thing from happening?
None of my assistants can get any gear out of any of the rental places in the states or Europe unless they show ID that matches their name on my account.
As far as I remember it used to work that way at Vistek back in the day as well. I also remember photocopies of driver’s licenses for new faces, I guess that isnt around anymore either.
Still sucks though.
What a looser.
I used to work at vistek in the rentals department, I’d always ask who’s picking it up and make note on the order. If Jeff shows up but it’s supposed to be John, we’d usually call in to make sure. The assistant would normally know what he or she is picking up too.
On the customers file we’d normally list assistants that are clear for pick up also, you’d pick up on familiar assistants for certain photogs rather quickly.
How this guy pulled this off is a healthy mix of impressive and disappointing. Rental houses in the states I find are less pressing than vistek or headshots, they’ll even drop off at your hotel room. Vistek doesn’t let this stuff slide, they’ll come up with a whole new system probably quite shortly.