The Tweet Repeat: Live Twitter Trip Report Recap - Lots of Photos (Part 31 11/1/09)

[disneygirlinnj]

Nice castle shot!

About the photographers... I hate to say it but for the most part they have no idea what they're doing. They aren't photographers. They're just people that get handed a camera and are told to go take photos and scan photopass cards. I noticed it a LOT more during night shots. During a sunset shot the pics weren't coming out that great and the photographer said he couldn't change the settings. His excuse is that someone else sets the camera settings or tells them what to put it on and that's what they have to use. I think it's BS and in reality he just had no idea what to change. I wish they would at least train these guys a little more!

 

[scoot241]

Nice castle shot!

About the photographers... I hate to say it but for the most part they have no idea what they're doing. They aren't photographers. They're just people that get handed a camera and are told to go take photos and scan photopass cards. I noticed it a LOT more during night shots. During a sunset shot the pics weren't coming out that great and the photographer said he couldn't change the settings. His excuse is that someone else sets the camera settings or tells them what to put it on and that's what they have to use. I think it's BS and in reality he just had no idea what to change. I wish they would at least train these guys a little more!

I agree J, and I do have to say that most of the shots that aren't that great are a result of an uncooperative 4 year old rather than poor settings. Overall the PhotoPass shots are good and I've been adding borders and changing sizes like crazy to them.

I believe it was later this day where one of the photographers told us "well, you get what you get" when I told him it didn't have a zoom. It's called move around, dude!

 

[disneygirlinnj]

Haha! Yeah...after that little sunset dilemna, I started taking test shots with my camera while on line waiting and getting the perfect settings. Then I would just hand the photographer my camera all ready to go and at least one said that my camera photo came out better than the photopass camera one

Can't beat the borders and fun stuff though. No matter how much I complain about the photogs, I still order the CD just for the cool pics!

 

[dax248]

Joining up for the recap.

Sorry I missed following you on Twitter. I love being able to do that, it is just awesome!

 

[scoot241]

Joining up for the recap.

Sorry I missed following you on Twitter. I love being able to do that, it is just awesome!

Welcome!

I'm really enjoying the Twitter Disney community that's starting to develop. It lets me keep up with others who are enjoying the World when I'm not and vice versa. Plus, I was getting all the D23 updates while I was at WDW last week without searching the web for them.

 

[scoot241]

After leaving the Magic Kingdom, we take a right and head up to the Resort Monorail.



It's Hailey's first ride on the monorail and naturally she's enjoying it. However, the monorail stops on the way to the Contemporary.

9/6/2009 4:36 PM EDT En route to ohana. Monorail driver is confused as to where he is. We're sitting on the beam in front of space mtn.

The monorail driver came on and said "Welcome aboard Monorail Lime. We're currently waiting for the monorail in front of us to clear the Polynes... to clear the Transportation and Ticket... you see that big A-frame building in front of us? That's the Contemporary Resort, and once the monorail in front of us clears the station, we'll be heading in there.

Naturally, I'm correcting him every time he says the wrong building even though he can't hear me. From this spot, I did get a nice shot of Space Mountain through the window.



We arrive at the Polynesian. There's a line forming on the left side of the 2nd floor lobby. Naturally, it's the line to check in for 'Ohana, our dinner ADR today. 'Ohana hadn't actually opened for dinner yet (it opens at 5:00 PM). I stand in line while most everyone else scatters for the moment. The line is back to Kona already.

A couple of shots from the lobby looking down:





A few minutes after they open, we finally get to the front of the line at:


Here's my mini-review from Twitter:
9/6/2006 6:02 PM EDT Ohana is awesome! Everything I've eaten is good, but my favorite is the pork (and this is coming from a steak person). Dessert coming soon.

(This is the one area I slacked on the whole trip: taking pictures of the food)

We had the usual 'Ohana dinner with all of our cousins. We started with the 'Ohana Welcome Bread and the salad, both quite good. I really liked the honey-lime dressing.

Next came the pork dumplings with sweet & sour sauce, and the chicken wings in honey sauce. Both sweet and delicious. They also brought out the various sauces for the meats.

Soon, the meats start showing up, along with the noodles and stir-fry vegetables. I tried some of each meat, and I still stand by my Twitter post. The pork is the absolute best and easily beats the steak.

Now Hailey loves shrimp, but she's not into spicy food yet. We mentioned this to our server (IIRC, his name is Brandon) and he mentioned it to the chef. After we had started getting our meats, he brought out a bowl full of shrimp just for Hailey that didn't have the spices on it. She did try one of the regular shrimp; at first she said she liked it then she said she didnt . But she started devouring the shrimp made just for her; we had to keep peeling them to keep up!

After filling up on the various meats, we were sitting nice and happy until we saw the desserts starting to come out. Wow, that banana bread pudding looks incredible!

However, something else arrived first:

9/6/2009 6:44 PM EDT The birthday treats begin. Hailey got a cupcake with an umbrella in it and a bowl of ice cream; both had Mickey sprinkles on top.



We sang Happy Birthday, and Hailey blew out the candle.

Our dessert came soon after:



9/6/2009 6:44 PM EDT The rest of us had the banana bread pudding; pretty awesome in its own right.

We went to town on the bread pudding, and Hailey went after the cupcake:



Overall, 'Ohana was excellent and I highly recommend trying to get a reservation there. The food and the atmosphere are wonderful.

It was raining a bit when we were done, so we took our time getting back to the Magic Kingdom.

Coming up: something special occurs at the Magic Kingdom.

 

[disneygirlinnj]

So I'm warning you now that I might tell you Hailey is the most adorable thing ever about a million times. Her curly hair is so adorable

Glad you liked Ohana! Still haven't been there yet but that banana bread pudding is totally calling my name.

Did you use long exposure on that Poly waterfall shot? Oh wait...I'll go stalk on flickr and find out lol

 

[scoot241]

Each picture in the trip report links directly to its Flickr page.

The waterfall was 1/6 of a second. It's a pain to look that up on the iPhone.

Thanks for the Hailey compliments! I'm starting to think she knows how cute she is.

 

[dax248]

Your pictures are absolutely amazing. Wow! Also, your daughter is too darn cute. I keep showing my DH the pictures and going 'AWWW look at her, I love that hair."

 

[scoot241]

Your pictures are absolutely amazing. Wow! Also, your daughter is too darn cute. I keep showing my DH the pictures and going 'AWWW look at her, I love that hair."

Thank you so much! Her hair is the #1 thing she gets compliments on.

I realized I still need an avatar picture here. Maybe I'll bring Dr. Teeth over from my Twitter account.

 

[dax248]

Thank you so much! Her hair is the #1 thing she gets compliments on.

I realized I still need an avatar picture here. Maybe I'll bring Dr. Teeth over from my Twitter account.

That would be an awesome avatar!

 

[scoot241]

That would be an awesome avatar!

And here he is.

Paint is such a primitive image editing program, but that's all I have at work.

 

[scoot241]

After finishing at 'Ohana, we rode Monorail Blue back to the Magic Kingdom.



Once we got out of the station, here's what we saw:



9/6/2009 7:16 PM Rainbow over MK; how cool is that?

We were heading to the Haunted Mansion; Hailey wanted it to be her second ride. Here's a couple of more rainbow shots:



We took PhotoPass pictures at the spot above while the rainbow was there.



As I said, we were on the way to the Haunted Mansion:



While we were walking in the queue outside, Pal Mickey told us about the horseless carriage:





Haunted Mansion is very tough to photograph, so one of the few usable images from inside that I have is from the stretching room.



Hailey liked most of the Haunted Mansion, but got a little scared at times, especially at the beginning of the ride if I recall correctly. Overall, another success!

After the Haunted Mansion, we went looking for a spot to set up for Spectromagic and Wishes. I found a trash can to put my Gorillapod and camera on for Wishes in front of Casey's Corner.

9/6/2009 8:23 PM Rode haunted mansion; now waiting on main street for spectro and wishes.



Coming up: Spectromagic after lots of waiting

 

[thecapells]

Great POTC pics!!

Can't wait to get there ourselves this November!
In the meantime, I'm subscribing to hear your fun!

 

[scoot241]

Great POTC pics!!

Can't wait to get there ourselves this November!
In the meantime, I'm subscribing to hear your fun!

Welcome! I was starting to look through your last TR. Poor baby! It looked like he was enjoying himself anyway though.

Thanks for the compliments on the photos!

 

[scoot241]

We're standing just up the street toward Cinderella Castle from Casey's. We've been parked there for a while, and a CM brought out some hula hoops for the kids to play with. Hailey joined in and tried to do the hula hoop:



Not long after this, we had a brief scare. However it exactly happened I'm not sure, but I thought Hailey was sitting in her stroller. She wasn't, so I asked where she was. No one knew! Thankfully, we turned around and she was behind us talking to a CM about her day and how she went on Pirates and HM. I guess the CM started talking to her, but I wouldn't be surprised if she was the one who initiated the conversation. We gave her another talk about wandering off and put her back in her stroller.

Finally, the first part of what we've been waiting on the curb all this time for: Spectromagic!



























These are some of my favorite photos so far. If you'd like to view any of them larger, click on the picture and it will take you to the Flickr page. There should then be a button over the picture that says "All Sizes". Click it and it should come up in a larger size.

Coming up: The Wishes dilemma, EMH and the end of the first day (finally!)

 

[annnewjerz]

Great Specto shots, Scott!! Quick question---were you right on the curb when shooting these (like front row) and if so, did you get this close to the floats using the 30mm or did you crop some of the dead space around the floats out? I had read recently on some thread that you can use the 50mm if you want a close-up view of the characters in the parade, but these shots look plenty close to me!

Can't wait to read/see more!

PS: I might steal your idea about incorporating the "tweets" into the TR when I eventually come back from The World. I recently signed up for a Twitter to win something and have no use for it. I've been thinking about how I will keep track of our day for the TR (a journal, live blogging, twitter, etc.) and I think a combo of twitter/live blogging from my iPHONE is the way to go. Who really wants to carry around a pen and paper to write everything down when you can just record it all electronically and pull it up when you get home?

 

[We_love_WDW]

Wow those are some really good pictures. What kind of camera do you have and where did you get it? After looking at your specromagic pictures I realized how bad our camera is -

 

[scoot241]

Thank you Ann!

I'm looking through the pictures now; I'm pretty sure some are cropped and some aren't.

Trumpeters: cropped to take out some extra stuff on the right
Guy on Ball: cropped, some stuff to the right, better composition
Spectro float with Mickey in background: no crop
First Mickey: cropped to make the picture a little tighter
Second Mickey: cropped, had some empty space above his head
Chip and Dale: no crop
Fairy floats and castle: cropped out a dragonfly on the right
Ursula: no crop; she came right in front of us
Ariel: cropped; composition and cut out Flounder
Chernabog: cropped, took out some empty space to the right of him
Cinderella: cropped, mostly to move Cinderella to the right
Prince Charming & Cinderella: no crop
End of parade: cropped, had some empty space

I was right on the curb next to a trash can near Casey's. It was a really good spot to watch the parade. Wishes was another story, however. That'll be for the next installment. Hmm... I may post one of my uncropped Wishes pictures to illustrate.

By the way, if you're wondering who just started following you on Twitter, it's me.

 

[annnewjerz]

Thank you Ann!

I'm looking through the pictures now; I'm pretty sure some are cropped and some aren't.

Trumpeters: cropped to take out some extra stuff on the right
Guy on Ball: cropped, some stuff to the right, better composition
Spectro float with Mickey in background: no crop
First Mickey: cropped to make the picture a little tighter
Second Mickey: cropped, had some empty space above his head
Chip and Dale: no crop
Fairy floats and castle: cropped out a dragonfly on the right
Ursula: no crop; she came right in front of us
Ariel: cropped; composition and cut out Flounder
Chernabog: cropped, took out some empty space to the right of him
Cinderella: cropped, mostly to move Cinderella to the right
Prince Charming & Cinderella: no crop
End of parade: cropped, had some empty space

I was right on the curb next to a trash can near Casey's. It was a really good spot to watch the parade. Wishes was another story, however. That'll be for the next installment. Hmm... I may post one of my uncropped Wishes pictures to illustrate.

By the way, if you're wondering who just started following you on Twitter, it's me.

Thanks for the info on the crops. I don't mind cropping a bit at all, just wanted to make sure there wasn't extremely heavy cropping to make up for the 30mm focal length. I've never even watched Spectro before (not into parades really) but plan to in October, so I'm glad to see some pictures using the same lens I'll be shooting with.

I had heard Casey's was a good place for Wishes, although my plan is to get right into the "hub" with my Tokina 11-16 and try to get some neat shots. We'll see how that works.

I wasn't wondering who was following me, I don't know many Scotts---especially not people who are on Twitter with WDW in their username. My first follower, maybe you'll get a special prize when I return from The World.