Do you let others take your picture?

[cobbler]

Ok, when at Disney we offer to take pics for a family if we are passing by. You know the mother and/or father who are never in any shots because they are behind the camera.

Well often when we are asked we do take them up on the offer as I am usually the one behind the camera, hubby has a knack for chopping off people's heads, or standing so far away we look like ants

Besides I just had a point and shoot and if someone were to take off running with it, or accidentally drop it would be ok. Now I would still be very upset but well, you know.

Now I have a nice new DSLR and I am much more concerned about something happening to that. So for those of you with SLR's do you let strangers take your picture with the camera if they offer or not? Why?

 

[Steve's Girl]

Usually, I ask the photopass photographers. Other than that, I usually don't hand over my camera to others.

 

[handicap18]

I've handed my camera to the Photopass photographers or the CM who is with them. I haven't had a regular total stranger take a pic for me. I have had other DISers take pictures for me though.

 

[The Grays]

I ahve had a couple of times not too much though. I was not worried about them running off...who can run fast and far at the parks? I always put the strap around their neck though

Dan

 

[Gdad]

No very rarely- and it kind of makes an uncomfortable moment sometimes when people offer. I did let a photopass guy take one of us with it- I have like six shots all the same of us- I guess I forgot it was in continous mode.

 

[H.E. Pennypacker]

Ha! I don't even like my girlfriend handling my camera, let alone some stranger! I did let a Photopass woman take a picture of us once, though.

 

[mabas9395]

I rarely do unless I am prodded by the wife. We have very few pictures with me in them, and even fewer with the whole family.

But even when I put it on "green box" mode, I never get good pictures. And its always interesting when I hear "Nice fancy camera, too bad your LCD doesn't work and you have to use the view finder".

 

[pxlbarrel]

hehe...this is how I get around not handing my camera over to somebody but I still end up in the photo. I take a photo of everybody, making note where I would be standing if I was in the photo. Then I get my brother to come and take a photo with his camera and and I go stand where I noted. I come home, photoshop myself into the photo and voila...instant family photograph.

His camera is a point and shoot and mine's a DSLR. Sooo...unfortunately, no RAW from his camera but it'll do in a pinch.

I handed my camera to a photopass person once...he cut off our feet and the top of the Tree of Life. I was not a happy camper.

 

[Greg K.]

If I'm using my DSLR, I'm usually reluctant to do that, because people generally aren't too fussy and more often than not, the pictures don't turn out very good. They're off center or out of focus or something. I've even had this experience with cast members (who should be better trained) when they take pics of us with the characters using my camera.

But if I have my fairly simple Canon P&S, and someone offers, I'll usually surrender, and the pix turn out fine.

Likewise, if I see that the person offering is carrying around a big camera bag and has a DSLR, and they offer, I'll happily let them snap away.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

I can't imagine handing my camera to someone. It's not because I think they would run off with it, but because I think they would run from it. It's big, ugly, and hard to understand. I guess it's sort of like Arnold Schwarzenegger in that way.

One thing that I've noticed is that when I walk around with my camera, I get asked by lots of other people to take their picture. That can be a real pain at times. However, when I'm fully decked out with all my pods and stuff, people don't ask me anything. They just try to keep a safe distance.

 

[DueyDooDah]

I only did this once. I handed my Canon to a photopass CM. He could not figure out how to use it. I had to set it on Auto for him, then he commenced to take two very bad photos. One funny thing that happened also. Those two photos came out as the only two .JPG files in the set. I never come out of RAW mode so I don't know how this happened.

To make a long story longer, if a photopass person has trouble using a dSLR, then I sure as heck won't ask someone carrying a P&S, or nothing.

Note: I do not fault the CM for this misfortune. It is not easy to pick up any of today's cameras and take a good photo unless you know it's layout. None are the same. And photopass CMs use Nikon, quite a bit different layout than a Canon. Also, it was a night shot using no tripod, with the popup flash. It would not have turned out well in any case.

 

[Suburbanmom]

I let a woman take our picture last fall at Disneyland. She had 2 children and stroller so I knew she wasn't going anywhere fast and she had a D80 hanging around her neck. I felt she was safe.

She allowed me to reciprocate and I took a photo of her and her kids with her camera. We Nikonians have to stick together.

 

[AndrewWG]

I only did this once on our last trip. Even then, it was just a photopass photographer that I gave my camera to. It was outside AK in front of the Christmas tree. What surprised me the most was that she seemed to have a working knowledge of the Canon 30D even though they all use Nikon's in the parks. She took a great pic!

 

[Ellen aka Snow White]

When I had my 35mm point and shoot I would actually ask people to take our pictures, then I would return the favor.
Now that I have my Nikon D50, I don't usually ask. We took advantage of the the photopass in order to get all our family photos. I made one exception last June when we were at Disney - we were picked as "family of the day" at EPCOT. There were two cm there directing us what to do. They were both photopass people! One of them saw my camera and offered to use it instead of his! It was the first time someone else had used my camera for such a long period of time!! He handed it back to me right before we left in the test track car and I was like OH YEAH - I MIGHT NEED THAT! My husband couldn't believe I almost forgot my camera!!
Ellen

 

[WillCAD]

I typically only hand my camera to a CM or to someone I know.

CMs are as human as I am and could drop the camera or take a bad pic, but that's a risk I run myself, too. But at least I know a CM won't run off with my camera, and a badly framed pic is better than no pic at all.

I don't bother handing my camera to the Photopass photographers, because their cameras are equal to mine, and the last few trips, I have been buying the Photopass CD anyway.

 

[amykay9377]

I am new to the dSLR world and I LOVE IT! I couldn't wait to take photos in WDW!

However, I am also way frugal and we couldn't afford to even PREpurchase a PhotoPass CD, so I did some research and saw on the DISboards that if you asked nicely, a photopass'er will also take a shot or two with YOUR camera after they take a few with their Nikons. Okay, I can handle that. Taking photos is what these folks do for a living. I felt that they were more trustworthy than the average Joe.

That being said, the quality of photography from each of these PP'ers varied greatly between photographers, so for the most part--the photos I took with the rest of my family were of the same (or greater, if I should toot my own horn) quality as theirs.

BUT, from a MOM point of view, not a PHOTOG point of view, it is nice to have photos of all of us in photos at teh same time. So, for me, it's worth spenidng a few minutes in PhotoShop to fix some issues.

 

[matthew_hull]

I agree with Greg; I will hand someone my P&S camera but not the heavy DSLR. Not because I'm afraid that they'll run off with it, but rather I doubt that they would take a decent picture with it.

I would never hand my DSLR camera over to a PhotoPass photographer, since these people are at their job, earning bread and butter frmo the sale of pictures. I would consider it an insult. I will, however, hand over a P&S camera to them, since the quality of their Nikon equipment is vastly superior to the P&S, and so they still have the opportunity to take (and sell) their own shot. My experience with the general quality of the PP pictures has not been positive, however.

 

[Sha]

I will let someone use my camera to take a pic of me.... if I know what kind of camera they use/experience. I have been lucky with some CMs and others, well... it was a waste of time. Like the group shot at Beaches and Cream this past weekend. The other thing is that I can delete it if I dont like it.

 

[oogieboogieman]

I will allow someone else to take our pictures with our P&S, not with my DSLR. If I dro_ it, it's MY fault, if someone else dro_s it, it's still MY fault (notice I won't say that word). My DSLR is not even that expensive as most on this board. To me that's almost as bad as someone wanting to use my golfclubs. That's a big NO NO !!!

 

[Villainess]

It's funny - my point of view has changed on this since learning more about photography and my camera. Last year's trip, I would hand my camera over to both Photopass photographers and strangers (XTI and kit lens). This past trip (same body but various lenses) I only handed my camera over to the Photopass photographer on occassion since we prepurchased the CD. I also received a number of comments from guests about the "fancy, schamcy" camera and even more when I used the tripod (Disney security questioned me in DTD). I didn't receive any offers from guests to take our pic w/ my camera; I was asked many times to take other's pictures. One time I offered to take a pic for a family w/ a DSLR and they declined.