Disneyland at Christmas/Holiday Season Superthread #3!- HOLIDAYS BEGIN 11/12/13!!

[mvf-m11c]

Inside and outside of the HMH.

Last year’s gingerbread house

 

[DBL101]

WOW WOW WOW! I've been off the thread for a week so it took a while to catch up from where I last read but I'm glad I took the time, the pictures are great and as a previous poster mentioned, inspiring! We'll be there 4 months from now soaking in all the fun that is Christmas time in DL for the first time!!!

I was wondering if any individuals out there would be willing to share a few tips for getting decent pictures of the Christmas decorations at night. I shoot with a DSLR (Canon Rebel T2i) and I know enough to be dangerous, I usually use natural light & I rarely shoot at night (and never outside at night) & i just got my first Speedlight for my birthday last month, but I'm assuming I don't want to use any flash to get these good shots. Any suggestion for settings? I do not plan to travel with a tripod, so all shots will be handheld. Would love and appreciate any recommendations!

I hesitate to post this because I’m no photographer, but I can pass on a bit of what I’ve learned from message boards, books, and my own trial & error.

There can be a lot of other factors, but a correct exposure primarily comes down to 3 pieces. ISO (the sensitivity of your film), Shutter Speed (how long the shutter is left open), and Aperture (the size of the lens opening). Depending on the camera, you can set one or two and let the camera set the other(s), set all three, or let the camera set all three. Very few photographers still use film, but digital cameras do still have ISO settings that work the same way they did on film.

What happens with many automatic settings is the camera ends up setting a slow shutter speed to get enough light and camera shake (or subject movement) results in blurry pictures.

You can set the sensitivity higher to take a faster picture, but higher ISO settings make for pictures that are grainier. If I don’t want to use a tripod, I’ll often set the higher ISO because I’d rather have a grainy picture than one that’s blurry. I have a 60D and I can usually go up to ISO:1000 with good quality, but I’ll even push it to 1600 or 3200 if I can’t get a picture without it. I will usually use shutter priority (Tv) to make sure I don’t get blur, and let the camera open the lens as much as it can. Keeping yourself still is the key. Leaning against a stable fence, or post can often help keep you steady. I try never to go slower than 1/80 (and prefer 100 or 125) because I can’t keep myself steady for a slower shutter speed.

To summarize, I'll usually choose the Tv setting, ISO of 1000 or 1600, and Shutter speed of 1/100 or 1/125. I'll then tweak each of them after reviewing the pictures. As with most photography, it comes down to trial and error with your own camera.

 

[Orbitron]

This is a theme I have a few pictures for, even though I have never been at the Disneyland Resort during Christmas Time!

One lonely little photo from New Orleans Square

Some impressions from Haunted Mansion Holiday

To complete everything, the master of the house

 

[Luisa]

Wow, everyone's pictures are amazing, makes me feel inadequate! My small contribution..







I'm so impressed by what I've seen I'm going to make sure I take more photos in November!

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

 

[Elk Grove Chris]

 

[Sherry E]

Just before I shut off the computer last night I saw that KCmike and danimaroo had posted some fantastic photos!

Imagine my delight when I signed on this morning to see that a whole new crop of fantastic photos had come in from Elk Grove Chris (just this morning!), Luisa, Orbitron, Bret/mvf-m11c and DBL101!!! What a delightful way for me to greet the day!!

Bret -- Can you help Trish/Phoenixrising figure out flickr, so her photos will appear in the posts instead of just the links appearing?



Thank you, everyone, for sharing your lovely photos in our second Theme Week of the 2013 Countdown. DBL101, Bret, Luisa, danimaroo and KCmike received their second entries in the random draw for the $25 Disney gift card (they all received entries last week as week).

Elk Grove Chris and Orbitron have received their first entries into the random draw. In fact, Orbitron -- you don't have to follow the code word challenge now because you have a guaranteed entry into the random draw by submitting your Haunted Mansion Holiday photos. So you saved yourself some time in having to keep a list of the code words, etc.!!!

Thanks to this thread (and my persistence), I can say with some certainty that my fiancé, Trent, and I will---thank God---be going this year to DL during the Christmas season!! Finally, he's made up his mind. Needless to say... I'm very excited. It looks like we'll be sticking with our original plan of sneaking in for a quick trip in early December, with my nieces Lucia and Ana. Now, my question: So, it seems like the CP brings in some crowds. I wouldn't mind this, but my less-Disney-enthused fiancé and new-to-Disneyland nieces are not on great terms with that idea. I'm trying to therefor figure out which dates would be better (i.e., less busy) to go on. We're thinking either Monday the 2nd of Dec. through Thursday the 5th, or Monday the 9th through Thursday the 12th. Since Thanksgiving falls unfortunately late this year---the 28th, I think?---I'm a little worried about blockbuster crowds or something. My nieces, being so new to the wonders of Disneyland, definitely get a little freaked out by swarms of people... as does my fiancé, but for different reasons. Anyone have an idea as to which dates might be better for us? Help, please!

Welcome back, Lucrezia!

I hope you were able to catch last week's theme too (it started on page 62, while this week's theme began on page 70) when you returned home from your trip. If you're following the code word challenge, you'll have to keep up!

The CP will have nothing to do with your trip. The late Thanksgiving should have nothing to do with your trip, or very little. If either of those elements had anything to do with your trip it would be to your benefit, not to your disadvantage. If anything, the CP crowds would clear out after 12/8, and the the late Thanksgiving may, perhaps, deter some folks from traveling this year -- as it is one week closer to the Christmas break than it usually is.

The holiday season in general is very popular so the parks will not be empty. You will run into some crowds here and there. It is almost never un-crowded near IASW Holiday at night. But there will probably be portions of the day when it is not crowded. Early on Monday, for example.

Enjoy the planning of the trip, know what to expect and don't worry!

As I've said many times in this thread and others, the time frames I choose to go for my annual holiday trips are either in the first week of December or the second week of December because I get the full holiday merriment and slightly lighter crowds. This year it seems like a lot of folks are going during those weeks (probably following my lead), so it may be busier than it normally is but it should still be bearable.

Really, I think either week would be good, but in your case the 12/2 - 12/5 dates would be slightly better because everyone will have cleared out after Thanksgiving.

 

[mvf-m11c]

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7390/9308150547_49d8598c5e.jpg
HM lamp Post

I'm attempting to copy pics to the thread using my Flickr account, which this is the first time I've attempted to upload pics to any thread in quite a while. If you click on the link, it will show the pics. Maybe with a little luck I'll find a way to upload them into the thread. Wish me luck.

Trish
HM Sandy Claws
http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2817/9310960384_ecb4a19efe.jpg
HM 2011 Gingerbread house:
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7340/9310918382_f4a8462920.jpg
HM 2010 Gingerbread house:
http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2805/9308056563_716dd13efa.jpg
Busts as you go towards the Doom Buggies
http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3716/9308181591_cb884916c2.jpg

There's got to be a better way of doing this, I just need to figure it out over the next couple of days. If you click on the links, they will show the pic, of which there's pics of the 2010 & 2011 gingerbread houses.
Pumpkin snowman:
http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2829/9308035823_c685035571.jpg

Hi Trish,

I can help you with the images on flickr to show on the threads. When I looked at your pictures with the formulas. You have the on your pictures which is the link...23_c685035571.jpg[/img] Hope this helps you.

 

[Sherry E]

Thank you, Bret! You're awesome!

I hope Trish comes back soon to see your helpful post (or I'll direct her back to it when she does come back). I knew you could solve the flickr problem for her.

 

[Phoenixrising]

I'm still figuring this out...

Attempt no 10.. and thanks to Brett and contacting flicker this tekk deprived may have gotten it..

There's got to be a step I'm missing somewhere. I've contacted Flickr and they are helping me figure this out. Obviously what they suggested didn't work, so am going to try figure this out.
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/greytbeginnings/9310960384/" title="DSC02939 by greytyetti!, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2817/9310960384_ecb4a19efe.jpg"[IMG] width="375" height="500" alt="DSC02939"></a>
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/greytbeginnings/9308097951/][img]http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3678/9308097951_4b3521496c.jpg[/url]
DSC04966 by greytyetti!, on Flickr

And we have victory!!!!!!!! Was grabbing the wrong code. See I do figure out things....eventually....now to post some more pics!

 

[DBL101]

I'm still figuring this out...

Attempt no 10.. and thanks to Brett and contacting flicker this tekk deprived may have gotten it..

There's got to be a step I'm missing somewhere. I've contacted Flickr and they are helping me figure this out. Obviously what they suggested didn't work, so am going to try figure this out.
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/greytbeginnings/9310960384/" title="DSC02939 by greytyetti!, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2817/9310960384_ecb4a19efe.jpg" width="375" height="500" alt="DSC02939"></a>

It's just a small begin and end tag on either side of the link to the picture. It's a little difficult to document because an actual example will display the picture instead of the code that shows you how to post. Here is an example with one of your pictures. I have an extra space inside each of the tags so the code will display.

[IMG ]http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2817/9310960384_ecb4a19efe.jpg[/IMG ]

Here is the same example with the spaces removed after the IMGs

 

[Phoenixrising]

DSC04976 by greytyetti!, on Flickr

Thanks to everyone who helped figure out to post online. I hadn't done it for a couple of years, and added to the confusion was that I switched from Webshots to Flickr. Have a great day everyone!

Trish

DSC02149 by greytyetti!, on Flickr


DSC03643 by greytyetti!, on Flickr

 

[dolphingirl47]

This is the only theme week I will have something to contribute to this year. My time will come in 2015.









Corinna

 

[Sherry E]

Trish -- Yay! You finally got it working! I have no idea what to do with flickr (I'm used to Photobucket, even though it has become more problematic than it's worth dealing with!) so I couldn't help you there. I'm glad that Bret and DBL101 were here to help you.



Corinna -- I wondered if you would post any of your HMH photos! I knew you had some (because I know you're a Halloween Time fan). I'm so happy that you posted them for us! (And I also hope that this thread is helping to give you an idea of what to expect/look forward to for your upcoming holiday trip!)

So do you want me to enter you into the random draw for the $25 gift card with this post of photos? If so, it is a guaranteed entry but then you can't try to win the other gift card with the code word challenge when the Countdown ends in November (which may come in handy if you don't have time to follow the code word challenge each week). If you want to stick with the code word challenge, then there's no random entry for the photo post -- but we will all enjoy your photos nonetheless!

It's up to you -- entry or no entry? Which do you prefer to do?

 

[dolphingirl47]

I will stick with the code word challenge. This will keep me on my toes.

Corinna

 

[Sherry E]

I will stick with the code word challenge. This will keep me on my toes.

Corinna

Corinna --

Okay -- cool!

 

[DisneyJamieCA]

Elk Grove Chris - your pictures are AMAZING!

I can't find any of NOS which really upsets me. It's one my favorite places in the park during the holidays, so I can't believe I don't have any. Something I will be sure to remedy this year!

Here are some HMH ones though.

 

[Orbitron]

Imagine my delight when I signed on this morning to see that a whole new crop of fantastic photos had come in from Elk Grove Chris (just this morning!), Luisa, Orbitron, Bret/mvf-m11c and DBL101!!! What a delightful way for me to greet the day!!

Yes, it's great that the Haunted Mansion is decked out for the holidays in October already!

Elk Grove Chris and Orbitron have received their first entries into the random draw. In fact, Orbitron -- you don't have to follow the code word challenge now because you have a guaranteed entry into the random draw by submitting your Haunted Mansion Holiday photos. So you saved yourself some time in having to keep a list of the code words, etc.!!!

Okay, it was fun looking for the code word, but this way it is even better! I hope there will be another theme I can submit photos for!

 

[perlster]

Flickr has changed its interface recently (and many think not for the better), but you actually don't need to worry about BB codes, HTML tags, etc. to post pictures on most discussion boards.

Instructions below are for Firefox - they wouldn't differ much for other browsers.

Left-lick on a picture in your photostream to go the individual photo's page.
Then left-click on the symbol below which turns red.
If you like, change the displayed photo's size in the drop-down menu.
Left-click in the big text box above the sizes - all the text should be highlighted.
Then, right-click the text and left-click "Copy" in the pop-up (or Control-C).
Paste into a message here (using left-click, "Paste" or Control-V), and the photo will be displayed.

and now for the actual result of those steps:


a Christmas "hello" from Mickey Mouse by perlster, on Flickr

[Note how flickr messes up the quotes in the title]


P.S. I actually recommend tinypic.com if you simply want to post a photo on a message board - rather than place it on a photo sharing site.

 

[figment_jii]

Well, most of my photos have already been posted on the Halloween Superthread, but they fit in with this weeks theme!

Welcome to Haunted Mansion Holiday...

Jack is waiting inside the elevator....

The paintings...they change...

Your doombuggy awaits...

A man-eating wreath...

Madame Leotta...

The gingerbread house from 2012...

The gingerbread house from 2011...

Sandy Claws....

Zero...

A graveyard that is covered in white snow...

Oogie Boogie waiting for you...

And Sally sending you off...

 

[Elk Grove Chris]

Elk Grove Chris - your pictures are AMAZING!

Thanks DisneyJamie