Can someone explain Photopass to me?

[Jennifer in WA]

Okay, I'm new to this board. I've been to DL and WDW several times, but have never heard of the Photopass. Now, we are receiving a "free 5x7" for photopass, and I'm reading about all of these photopass shares.

Can someone explain about how photopass works? I know there are photographers throughout the parks that take your picture and then give you a card or something. From that, what happens?

I'm a major scrapbooker, so have always taken LOTS of photos. What's the bonus of using photopass? How much is it? Is it worth it?

Just looking for more input!

 

[bumbershoot]

Photopass photographers take your picture and scan the card they give you (you can use just the first card you get, you can get a new card every day, heck, you could get a new card from every photographer if you'd like, LOL). That links the picture to an account.

The bonus is that everyone is in the picture.

On the other hand, the photographers are generally happy to take the same picture with YOUR camera as well.

You can look at the pictures in the photo centers at the parks. You can order (really expensive) prints, or mugs, or various other gifty things. You can make a photopass photobook through Disney if you want.

But the thing most people do, at least most people on the Dis who are interested in photopass, is get the CD. The CD gives you the full resolution pictures on a disc, with the rights to print those pictures for your own personal purposes, forever.

When you scrapbook, if you are proficient with editing software and can add your own fun things to the pix, or if you just like the plain pictures, buy the CD at the park to take home with you, and they generally have a deal where you get a few prints along with the CD.

If you want to check out the little borders you can get, including things like appropriate signatures for official character meet/greet places, you can wait until you are home, put the card ID numbers onto the disneyphotopass site, and edit them. Crop, add borders, signatures, and so on. Each time you save an edit it saves another picture; your original, plain picture always remains intact.

Then when you're done you can order the CD, and you get all of that on your CD, and can print them wherever you want (as long as they have reasonable, intelligent staff who understand that the release you have on the disc actually does allow you to make prints!).


And that's what photopass is and what you can do with it.

 

[got2travel]

Each time you have one of the professional photographers take your picture you have them scan your Photopass card. That essentially loads all your photos onto that account. Some will ask if you already have a card, others will just scan a new card for you. If you do end up with multiple cards, just hang on to them. It's also a good idea to either take a picture of the back of your card or at least write down the code that's on the back, just in case the card gets lost. At certain photo oportunities in the parks the photographers can add images to your pictures such as you holding Tinkerbell, you sword fighting Captain Hook, hitchhiking with the ghosts from HM. There's a lot of different choices.

You can either view your pictures at the photoshop on Main Street, or once you get home you can go online and view them all. Online you have the option of adding borders, character signatures and various decorations.

You can then order individual prints or a photo CD with all the pictures. The 'shares' are a group of people going in together on the cost of the CD. The person running the share collects money from everyone to cover the cost of the order from Disney and also the cost of burning and mailing additional CDs to all the participants.

disneyphotopass.com has more info. I believe the CD is $99.95 but there is a way to get it for $59.95. I can't remember if you have to preorder the CD or not. I'm sure someone else will explain.

Also search the photo threads as there are examples of Photopass picutres.

 

[Sherry E]

The CD is not $99.95 to my knowledge. It may more expensive if you try to pre-order it, if that is even possible with the DLR CD. (It does not work exactly the same as the WDW PP process, in which case the pre-order makes mroe sense.) It may even be more expensive to buy the CD in DLR. I would just order it from the PP site.

In any case, the easiest and cheapest thing to do is wait until you get home to buy the CD online from the PP site, and pay $59.95 plus $7.00 shipping, for a total of $66.95. The only reason it may cost more than that from that point is if you add any PP cards from WDW onto the same account. If you only have DLR photos and you buy the CD from the PP site, it will be $66.95...that is, until they raise the price, which could happen soon!

The main thread with PhotoPass pictures is called "PhotoPass Poses: The Cheesier the Better." That has lots of examples of different poses and effects and holiday photos and what not: http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1954446