Moreover, the dwindling few who adhere to an unwritten code of Los Angeles paparazzi - that the ideal picture is one that a celebrity does not even suspect has been taken, shot by a photographer who is neither seen nor heard - say they are being given a bad name by hordes of untrained or corner-cutting paparazzi who are loath to lie in wait in cramped cars for hours or days and are willing to make their presence known, even to jump out at celebrities on the street, if it means a chance for quick cash.

"It's much like the gold rush," said Frank Griffin, a partner in Bauer-Griffin, one of the most established picture agencies in Hollywood. "It starts off with quite a few honest, hard-working prospectors who strike it rich now and again. And then you get the hangers-on, the camp followers, the hookers, all the rest of the garbage that comes along because they think the streets are lined with gold."

"Britney's not going to drive crazy," Mr. Cousart says, by way of example. "So you don't have to be right on her tail. But there's going to be that one photographer on her bumper. So we call each other, the other teams. Whenever we're in a follow with the French guys, we say make sure they don't get in the front. We try to block them out, because they drive like idiots."

Mr. Cousart says he regrets the way this might look, "like we're outlaws, taking the law into our own hands." But he says it is necessary, though it is also rendered futile whenever a celebrity decides to elude her pursers.

"If she's going 100, someone's going to go 100 with her," he says. "Either you pull off the story, or you hold everyone on the team back and you say, Let them be. But the other guys are not going to let them be."