Are You Ready for Your Close-Up?

This came in over the transom this week:

Lewisburg – The Pennsylvania Election Project is seeking volunteer “field correspondents” to help produce online video coverage of the Commonwealth’s 2006 elections.

“We are asking Pennsylvanians to get out their digital camcorders and make video of the political process in their communities this year,” said Peter Wiley, organizer of the Election Project.

“We’ll take the submitted video and make it available online for everyone in the state to see. The result, we hope, will be a unique online document that will tell the story of Pennsylvania’s democracy in action through the eyes of its citizens over the course of the year,” said Wiley.

Anyone interested in contributing video to the Election Project should visit the project Web site at www.paelection2006.com for information on how to make a submission.

It sounds like an interesting project but sets off alarm bells for someone like me, who ducks cameras at every opportunity. I've been at two political events this month and at each I've had to find some tall person to quietly step behind when the guy with the public access channel camera starts panning the room. But some people like to be on film so, hey, if you have a camera, give it some thought. Just take a hint if there are people in the room who suddenly hold a sign up in front of their face or have to stoop down and tie a shoe every time the red light goes on, and point the thing somewhere else.