WDW time again... complete trip photos finally posted!

[Swoop1]

Very impressive stuff Groucho. Can't wait to see some more.

 

[Groucho]

Thanks Swoop1!

More all-new pics, folks. Here's the rest of day eight. We continued our way around World Showcase, Japan was next...

I really like the tin toys...

Over to American Adventure.

We caught the Voices of Liberty show before the main attraction. (Which I had ignored for a while but is now back near the top of my must-see list after the past couple trips.)

Here's the statue for those of us who don't use a Canikon.

Over to Italy...

Technical note: I used Lightroom's adjustment brush to darken the sky in this shot... hopefully no one would notice if I didn't say so!

Over to Germany... this shot seems like a fever-driven nightmare! Creepy!

We ate dinner at the Biergarten, it was my first time there and it was quite good! I also enjoyed the band. However, I was starting to feel a little under the weather so I didn't eat too much. Our "adventure" wasn't over... especially when Jack managed to get his hand stuck between the slats in the chairs! He was pretty upset but managed to not freak out too badly - meanwhile the waiter is off trying to find a screwdriver to take the chair apart, and the manager was running off to the buffet to grab a bowl of butter! (Which was actually my first though, too.) He put some butter on Jack's hand and after a minute or two, his hand popped right out. They brought him a huge gingerbread cookie and later a Snow White book for being so brave. This really was a trip full of drama! We will have to go back to the Biergarten another trip and have a calmer meal!

By the time we got out, it was getting about time for Illuminations, so we found a decent spot and I set up the tripod.

(continued!)

 

[Groucho]

(continued from last message)

I thoroughly enjoyed Illuminations again, it's such a great show.

I tried some vertical shots, to mix things up a little.

By now, it was too late to visit the countries we had missed (China, Norway, Mexico, and maybe others?), so we just went with the crowd and headed toward the exit. By now, I was starting to feel a little worse but I kept trying to convince myself that I was going to be OK - after all, I'd felt great every day up to then! Alas, it was not to be...

We actually managed to catch a bus almost immediately (we really had pretty fantastic bus luck this trip) but it was standing room only. My wife and Jack ended up on a seat way in the back and I was stuck by the rear doors with the stroller. As we took off, I realized that throwing up was no longer a matter of "if" but "when" - and that my wife had the bags we were carrying around in case of this! Fortunately, I remembered that I had bought an Off Kilter CD (we never got a chance to see them live ) that I'd stuck in the stroller. I managed to get the bag that it was in and got that ready. I almost made it to Old Key West, but started being sick right as we pulled in! I jumped off at the first bus trip, which my wife wasn't expecting and she had to battle her way through the bus to exit, at which point the bus doors closed on her! Ack! Anyway, she was able to get off safe and sound. I started to feel a little better and after sitting for a few minutes with no other bus in sight (not real surprising; at this late hour, the only busses were returning from Epcot or going to Downtown Disney), I decided to just walk the half mile or so to our room. And so began one of the most grueling nights of my life...

Coming up next, the last day and a half! Hope you're enjoying it so far...

 

[DisneySuiteFreak]

I'm really enjoying your photos, but man I feel so bad for you and your family! Getting sick on vacation sucks. (I got sick the last 2 times I went to Disneyland, and I only get to go once a year!) But the kind of sickness you all had is probably the worst! Bummer...But thanks for the awesome photos. I also really appreciate the comments about how you tweaked some of them in LR. I'm sure it'll come in handy...

 

[Moeluv4u7]

Groucho,

Love the photo trip report. Hate that all 3 of you got sick during such a great trip! You have some great shots! Since I am just starting out w/ a DSLR I won't have all the "extras" you carry but I do hope to get some awesome shots! I will have to keep in mind to "hide" my camera at RnR if I want to get a shot- (I would really love to)
Jack is a cutie- I am sure he will be a wonderful big brother. Keep us posted on how your wife is doing.

 

[Groucho]

Thanks Luv and DSF! Glad you're enjoying.

DSF, I can go into a little more Lightroom detail if you would like. A few of the shots have had a good amount of tweaking done - like the statue in Italy. The fireworks shots all have a reasonable amount of work done... out of the camera, they tend to be somewhere around 3800-4000. I usually bring them down to closer to 3200, which gives more pleasing (IMHO) background colors but can fade the color on the fireworks. I then bump up the saturation (and the vibration to a lesser extent) which usually brings the colors right back, and maybe go a little brighter than the original. I also usually do a little bit of recovery, which shows a little more detail on the trails (especially the last photo, which turned out fairly overexposed), and sometimes put in just a little fill light to brighten up the smoke clouds, to give a little more content to the photo. If you wanted to get rid of the smoke, you could bring up the black levels. I also often go into the tone curve and bring up the lights and darks a little - I've been doing this with lots of my shots lately. You can also play with clarity if you want to either really make the fireworks "pop" or make them diffuse.

As for getting sick - yes, it was miserable! I'm really ready to go back right now but will have to wait until next year at the absolute earliest. I'm tentatively thinking about a trip around the same time but one week later, missing MLK day... I'm not sure, it's just a thought at this point. I do want to stay for at least a day or two in the new Treehouse Villas next trip, too! AND - stay healthy for a whole trip for a change!

 

[DisneySuiteFreak]

Thanks Luv and DSF! Glad you're enjoying.

DSF, I can go into a little more Lightroom detail if you would like. A few of the shots have had a good amount of tweaking done - like the statue in Italy. The fireworks shots all have a reasonable amount of work done... out of the camera, they tend to be somewhere around 3800-4000. I usually bring them down to closer to 3200, which gives more pleasing (IMHO) background colors but can fade the color on the fireworks. I then bump up the saturation (and the vibration to a lesser extent) which usually brings the colors right back, and maybe go a little brighter than the original. I also usually do a little bit of recovery, which shows a little more detail on the trails (especially the last photo, which turned out fairly overexposed), and sometimes put in just a little fill light to brighten up the smoke clouds, to give a little more content to the photo. If you wanted to get rid of the smoke, you could bring up the black levels. I also often go into the tone curve and bring up the lights and darks a little - I've been doing this with lots of my shots lately. You can also play with clarity if you want to either really make the fireworks "pop" or make them diffuse.

As for getting sick - yes, it was miserable! I'm really ready to go back right now but will have to wait until next year at the absolute earliest. I'm tentatively thinking about a trip around the same time but one week later, missing MLK day... I'm not sure, it's just a thought at this point. I do want to stay for at least a day or two in the new Treehouse Villas next trip, too! AND - stay healthy for a whole trip for a change!

Ooh! Thanks for the LR tips! I need all the help I can get. I really do appreciate you posting this and also posting your Exif info. It really helps me to figure out how you got the shot, what works and how to duplicate it for myself.
I was just telling my DH that we need a do over trip because I was ripped off on the last 2 DL trips since I got sick! We bought APs on our last trip, so maybe we can squeeze in another one before the winter. I hope...
Your son is such a cutie pie! Those eyes are going to get him into trouble with the young ladies one of these days. He has those smouldering, deep thinking kind of eyes...The girls are going to love him!

 

[Groucho]

I'll try to do some more LR notes in some of the other shots. Occasionally I'll take it as a challenge to try to make a somewhat dull shot interesting - for example, the Italy statue shot looked a little dull out of the camera. The WB is as shot, but I bumped up the exposure about a half-stop, used just a little recovery (11, I often do minor recovery when turning up the exposure to avoid bright areas being wiped out), turned the constrast way up (+84!), turned up the clarity a little more than usual (+19) and just a little saturation (+7).

The big work was done in the tone curve - highlights are +14, lights are +5, darks are -5, and shadows are a big -38 - this was to darken the background and let the statue itself stand out more. Note that this was pretty much all done experimentally; I was just seeing what I liked and didn't and ended up with these numbers.

Here's how it looked originally: (with my usual, base-level LR tweaks that are applied to every photo)

 

[DisneySuiteFreak]

I'll try to do some more LR notes in some of the other shots. Occasionally I'll take it as a challenge to try to make a somewhat dull shot interesting - for example, the Italy statue shot looked a little dull out of the camera. The WB is as shot, but I bumped up the exposure about a half-stop, used just a little recovery (11, I often do minor recovery when turning up the exposure to avoid bright areas being wiped out), turned the constrast way up (+84!), turned up the clarity a little more than usual (+19) and just a little saturation (+7).

The big work was done in the tone curve - highlights are +14, lights are +5, darks are -5, and shadows are a big -38 - this was to darken the background and let the statue itself stand out more. Note that this was pretty much all done experimentally; I was just seeing what I liked and didn't and ended up with these numbers.

Here's how it looked originally: (with my usual, base-level LR tweaks that are applied to every photo)

Wow! What a huge difference! Thanks so much for the tips, I'm copying it all down and bookmaking the page for future reference.

 

[Todd_H]

Here's how it looked originally: (with my usual, base-level LR tweaks that are applied to every photo)

Great shots as usual Groucho and a really great example of how to make an already good shot much more interesting with PP. One question for you regarding your "base-level LR tweaks": what exactly do you in LR automatically to every photo right out of the camera? I just started using LR2 back in December and am really liking it so far, but I have a lot to learn. Thanks!

 

[WVDisGeek]

Count me in too. I am getting ready to do the LR trial and will probably get it based on everything I am reading on these boards and in the Kelby book. I would love to know what your "every photo" base tweaks are. I also just started shooting RAW so it is even more relevant now.

 

[Groucho]

Thanks folks! Glad you like the changes on that shot. I would not process every photo that way, but once in a while it's fun to make it the photo a little less realistic.

As for my base Lightroom settings... First, I have it set so that all photos automatically get the "Camera Standard" color profile. I prefer this over the "ACR" profile (too orangey) and the "Adobe Standard" profile (too blood-red.) It could probably use just a touch more tweaking - some skin tones tend to get little red blotches sometimes, but it's pretty minor.

I just noticed that the develop presets are stored as text files so I can just cut and paste what's in my usual develop preset:

			AutoContrast = false,
			AutoShadows = false,
			Clarity = 7,
			Contrast = 32,
			ConvertToGrayscale = false,
			EnableDetail = true,
			Shadows = 3,
			SharpenDetail = 25,
			SharpenEdgeMasking = 0,
			SharpenRadius = 1,
			Sharpness = 45,
			Vibrance = 16,

Shadows = the Black slider. By default it's 5, setting it to 3 brings out a little more shadow detail though it can lessen contrast slightly and probably show a little more noise. Other than Black, the main other ones that are actually changes are Clarity to 7 (just a little bit), Constrast to 32 (again, just a slight bump over the default 25), Vibrance to 16 (gives a bit more "pop" to the colors without being over-the-top), and Sharpness to 45 - adding just a little bit, though I think much of that gets lost as it gets resized down to a more manageable size.

I finally finished processing my photos from the trip so I'll put the last photo update in a separate response.

 

[Groucho]

First, a few Jack photos I missed from earlier days... this one is at our Boma breakfast.

This was playing around with the macro lens at Epcot.

...When we last saw your intrepid reporter, I was returning to our room. Without getting too gross, I ended up being sick a total of ten times, the last time at 5am. I got little if any sleep that night, having to get up out of bed every 20-30 minutes. Needless to say, I was in no shape to head out the next morning!

Our original plan for the previous night was to head to Downtown Disney and do our big shopping trip, as well as some other DD wandering. That didn't happen, so Jack and my wife headed there this morning while I slept. This meant less chance of me buying anything that I didn't really need but what fun is that? I actually have only started buying souvenirs in the past couple trips; but by and large, I am lucky in that I can usually visit and not feel the need to buy much of anything.

Anyway, they returned late morning and I was still pretty zonked. They then headed over to Magic Kingdom, where I believed that we had Crystal Palace reservations for 6:30. I hoped to join them sometime in the afternoon. My wife called and checked in at, IIRC, about noon and I wasn't ready yet. Next check-in was 3 and I said that I would hopefully be getting up soon. I spent the next hour accomplishing nothing more than rolling over one single time in bed. Some workout! Finally at 5 I decided to get out of bed, and I checked my "cheat sheet" with reservations on it - and found that our Crystal Palace reservations were for 5:30, not 6:30! I quickly called my wife and left her a voicemail and started throwing on clothes. I decided to travel light and grab only the camera and the 16-50mm lens - no bag, no other lenses. Even being sick, I'm certainly not going to leave the camera behind, though! Especially at dusk...

I ended up getting there at about 5:45, right as we were getting seated. Turns out also that just before I got there, our next-door neighbors from New York were being seated, too! It's a small world, after all.......

I sat through dinner and managed to have a couple bites of food, and Jack had a great time with the characters. We headed out and caught some SpectroMagic and I tried some shots with the camera on the railing of the bridge.

We watched Wishes and I managed to get the strength to hold Jack during it - it was tiring but worth it, it's really great to spend time with him like that. We then did one or two rides, including possibly the most entertaining Jungle Cruise ride yet. I highly recommend the night rides, and the skipper was great, much better than the rather stiff one we had earlier in the trip. He was also fascinated with Jack, who was just so happy about everything.

We made a quick stop over to the Contemporary so I could pick up on of the miniature versions for the monorail set. They appear to be back in production again and it's cheaper than buying them on eBay! Jack was zonked by now... times like this, it was nice to have the stroller!

We headed back to our room, did a couple minutes of packing, then headed for bed. In the morning, I was starting to feel slightly more human and we quickly worked on finding a way to pack all our stuff back into our suitcases. We left our stuff with the Magical Express folks and headed back to Magic Kingdom and, with lots of snack credits to use up, headed for Main St... we used 'em all up and found ourselves bringing home a bunch of extra food, which is not a bad thing. (I wish I could find somewhere locally that makes turnovers like the ones at the Main St Bakery!)

Jack hadn't had a chance to get his first Splash Mt ride yet so we went over there to try to get a ride in... we only had a little over an hour, so I was very happy to find that it was almost a walk-on! Jack had a great time... and would scold me any time I took my hands off the safety bar! (Sorry about the blurry photo here.)

Some shots heading down the big hill... gotta love weather-sealed equipment.

These two are about a third of a second apart...

We got off and still had time, so we were even able to squeeze in another Big Thunder ride. Not bad - two of the busiest thrill rides at MK in less than an hour!

We started our way back to the exit and got back to OKW with about 15 minutes to spare, and we spent our time trying to consolidate our extra treats into fewer containers and figure out how to fit them all on our carry-ons! We had an uneventful ride home and got back to the usual grind, including getting a few inches of snow a few days later that needed shoveling. Bleh!

So, that's the trip. I hope you enjoyed the report and photos and I appreciate all your comments!

 

[WVDisGeek]

Thanks again for the great shots throughout the post! Also, thank you for the LR presets. I should be getting started on LR this weekend. Just spent the last week having my computer overhauled! Spent the last two days home sick with the flu, but managed to get most everything on the computer restored and running again! (Got to love backup drives!!!)

I empathize with the being sick on a Disney trip. In 2006 I got to ride the much less advertised "Mouse Ambulance" to Celebration Hospital with severe dehydration. Then this past December, had the knee problem. It is pretty sad when you are on vacation, but the local ER still has you on file. Glad your's was not that bad.

 

[ChipNDale]

Thanks for this great report and all the Great Photos WOW
Thank you so much! Groucho

 

[Todd_H]

Thanks very much for taking the time to share these Groucho. A very nice job all around .

 

[DisneySuiteFreak]

Groucho thank you so much for sharing your wonderful photos, LR info and your Exif info! I really appreciate it!

 

[Disneyfreak92]

Thanks for sharing Groucho!! Great shots! I always enjoy your photo trip reports.

 

[Groucho]

Thanks so much, guys!

I will probably be adding the ExposurePlot results in a day or two, which show the breakdown of what focal lengths, ISOs, shutter speeds, and apertures were most used.

 

[hanutedmansionmomma]

awesome photos!

I really appreciate when folks aren't lining people up like they're going to be shot to take pics. I especially appreciate your off-center pics, looking up at things pics, and my favorite...the food pics!

People always think I'm weird at a wedding or function when I'm taking pics of food or archetectural details instead of the people! My sister is always asking, "but who was there???"

I'm too lazy to do the "real" camera, so I cheat w/ a nice resolution digital and crop and make myself look like a better photog then I really am.

Thanks again for sharing