Photo Package

[nutshell]

Hello! I want to get a photo package either from Disney Cruise or from Disney World, but not both. It’s too expensive. We’re spending a few days in the parks then doing a cruise. Which photo package do you think I should get? Cruise will probably be nicer, but probably more photos from the parks. Thoughts?

 

[britinva]

You will have more character opportunities and more smart attire opportunities on the cruise

 

[chrisnb]

we just did 4 day cruise and 5 days disney world and we got about same amount of photos,maybe few more on cruise, and the cruise ones you get a printed copy of all of them, you can pre-buy cruise package and save a few dollars.
chris

 

[Drusilla99]

I generally lean towards cruise photo packages over park photo packages if I have to choose . I always wonder when I’ll be on another cruise, but I’m always going to be in the parks.

 

[FigmentSpark]

How many days are you in the parks? If it's only 1 or 2, maybe make a push to get all your photos on one day, then do the one day package for (I think) $59.99. You have to have an ipad or phone and you do the purchase on the app after the first photo is taken. Then you'd be able to buy the cruise photos.

Another point is if you're looking for character photos, then you can get them on the cruise or in the parks. It might be more effective you use your cruise time getting photos rather than your touring time. Then, if you really want that cool photo in front of the castle or tree of life, etc, you could always just buy those photos as one-offs, which will also be cheaper (although still expensive).

 

[PrincessArlena'sDad]

How is the quality of the photographers on the cruise, compared to Photpass photographers at Disney World?

We had the unlimited memory maker at Disney World and most of the pictures weren't that good. However, we were there for 2 weeks, and had hundreds of pictures (with lots of character visits). And, at the military rate of $89 (at the time), we absolutely got our money's worth, just for the 10% of pictures that we liked.

But, the cruise will be $295 for 8 days. If the quality is the same as at Disney World, I'm not sure we'd get our money's worth.

 

[owensamo]

How is the quality of the photographers on the cruise, compared to Photpass photographers at Disney World?

We had the unlimited memory maker at Disney World and most of the pictures weren't that good. However, we were there for 2 weeks, and had hundreds of pictures (with lots of character visits). And, at the military rate of $89 (at the time), we absolutely got our money's worth, just for the 10% of pictures that we liked.

But, the cruise will be $295 for 8 days. If the quality is the same as at Disney World, I'm not sure we'd get our money's worth.

I've always been pretty impressed with the photos we get from the cruise ship photographers. We've had many of the lifestyle photos that look like a professional sitting. I look at the photo package price as equivalent to the sitting fee for a good photographer - so if I end up with 100 photos I like, I'm ahead. When we pre-purchase the package, we always make sure to take as much advantage of the photographers and opportunities as possible. We've seen some iffy photos (weird positioning, odd poses, bad smiles, etc), but I assume they don't even bother with the bad ones (out of frame, blurry, etc) as I've never seen any of those. On our last 7 night cruise, we ended up with more than 100 photos and there were very few we thought were bad.

 

[MSPeeler]

I’m struggling to figure out how I’ll get even close to 100 photos on a 7-night Cruise. What are they taking pictures of?
I can see a family photo each night =7
Each character meeting = 2 or so per character interaction

Other than that, what are photographers taking pictures of.

 

[olafLover]

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[owensamo]

Additionally, there are photographers on the beach at Castaway Cay doing candid shots, and you will also sometimes find photographers at the more popular/common tourist spots taking pictures of those on DCL excursions. I believe there are often photographers in Palo and Remy as well, though we haven't gotten pictures taken there in our last few cruises. Photographers will also take multiple photos during character meet and greets - they start at intro and snap anything that looks cool/cute (not just the poses) so you can get 5-10 for one person just from character interactions.

We can get 200-300 photos from a 7-n cruise for our family of 3. Our last cruise was a MDAS and Merrytime cruise, so we had tons of character and holiday photos.

 

[PrincessArlena'sDad]

How far in advance do people order the photo package? Our cruise isn't until June 2019, but the package is already available.

The only advantage I see in giving Disney $295 almost a year in advance is I'm protected against price increases.

Would they raise prices after packages are available?

 

[Anchors Away 2016]

I’m struggling to figure out how I’ll get even close to 100 photos on a 7-night Cruise. What are they taking pictures of?
I can see a family photo each night =7
Each character meeting = 2 or so per character interaction

Other than that, what are photographers taking pictures of.

At many of the dinners, they come by and take pictures too. They will take a group shot if you ask, but mostly they do "couples" shots of whoever is next to each other. That way, no one needs to get up. We started mixing around our group of 9 from night to night to get different combinations. These are some of my favorite pictures from the trip. Mother and son, Father and daughter, etc. Nice close up shots.

As @owensamo said, the Castaway Cay pictures are nice too. We got several shots of us together in the water at Castaway Cay. Good stuff.

The formal night pictures are great, but those are likely to be the longest lines. Get there early if you can.

We ended up with 100 or so shots from our 7 days, and about 2000 of our own pictures (from multiple cameras and phones). But when I went through them all and picked out my favorites, I had about 25 of theirs and 75 of ours, so their "hit rate" was pretty high and overall, I thought it was worth it for us.

One last thing, we had one member of our group who hates posing for photos, but because we had already paid for the package, he wanted to "get his money's worth." Thus, we have more pictures of him from that trip than all the other trips I've taken with him combined. That alone is priceless to us.