Trip Report *Food Update* The Get Out of My Way, Watch Your Child, Turn Your Flash Off & SHUT UP Trip Report!!!

Food Update here *Food Update* The Get Out of My Way, Watch Your Child, Turn Your Flash Off & SHUT UP Trip Report!!!


Wow, so I am just digging in here on this thing. Picture editing, camera issues, and pure laziness has had this on delay.

Before I get started though I want to say thanks to Tom (WDWFigment). He really has helped me in so many ways with camera questions, photoshop, lens stuff. Anything I asked he has been great and always willing to take a phone call from a disgruntled "photographer". Pretty much any great or good pictures you see...he knowing, or unknowingly had a hand in there some how. So in all seriousness...thanks bud.

Now a little bit about my upcoming trip (that already happened)...

Travel Dates were August 25th through September 7th.

We have a 6:30pm flight to leave Pittsburgh.

The stars of this show will be my fiance Colleen, and myself. There will be some guest appearances but you guys only are here because of me so screw them. HAHA no we will get to them once their spot come up.

Leading up to this trip the time FLEW BY. 1 year went by so fast that it's pretty crazy when I sit back and think about where all that time went. It seemed like 180 days was here in an instant. Then 100 days, then before I know it my Magical Express and Vouchers are in my mail box. Then I am on the airplane...

The flight was pretty interesting to say the least. I am not the most relaxed person so to speak when on an airplane. It's not my most favorite thing in the world to take part in...flying, that is. We were flying down as the Hurricane was flying up. So winds in Orlando were pretty wild, and the flight was pretty bumpy. Nothing CRAZY but still...the more smooth the better. With that said the captain kept giving us weather updates for Orlando saying it was windy and raining. We flew right in and touched down and there was no wind or rain. I was very happy about that.

So we exit the plane and walk over to the tram and this greets me...

Yeah so now I am pretty amped up at this point and I am starting to get that feeling that "Okay...we are here"

So off the tram and down to the Magical Express area. Now anyone who "knows" me or read my trip before you know that I am a huge fan of taking pictures of people who are doing weird things, wearing odd clothes, or speedos. Some of you are fans of it and some of you are not. I have said time and time that I do not look for this, if it presents itself I will snap it and so on. Well we are not even in line yet and something crazy presents itself...

Yeah this lady was dragging her child around on her luggage through the whole first level of the airport. Aint that like half a mile, or does it just seem like it? Anyways for the most part that is pretty much the only "people pics" I got. There are 2 or 3 more so I am sure that will have some of you on the edge of your seat biting your toe nails...

Anyways back to the adventure...

We are on the bus!!!

We arrived at All Star Sports and Nick was waiting for us at the front door. I quickly said what's up and ran to check in before everyone else. Online check in this time was pretty shocking. I walked up to the counter and everything was ready. Dude basically handed my packet and room keys and basically was like "peace dude". I was like ummm is that it?

Our room was located right on the first building outside the cafe on the left. Touchdown something...I forget. But to my surprised the football field was all fenced off. I am immediately ed. I go look and they have new turf down, painted plays all over the field. It looked pretty much like it was almost finished so I calmed down a bit. So we went to our room, put our carry on bags down and headed out the door to go to Planet Hollywood and to meet up with a buddy! We got to Planet Hollywood where we met up with Karen (MillerPoppins) who just happened to be hanging out in Orlando while we were there! Prior to leaving she messaged me and told me she would be down there for a good portion of our trip and she wanted to try The Crunch Chicken. I agreed to meet up with her after careful review. Turns out she was okay. My review was dead on and we are very happy to have got to meet her/know her.

After Planet Hollywood we said out goodbyes and discussed meeting up again and that was that. Nick dropped us off and I dragged Colleen back to the lake at Sports that I wanted to fish at. First we stopped at "The Tennis Court" because I wanted to get a picture of Donald with a new friend next to him...

After seeing the lake we walked back through the lobby for some stupid reason...

Here are a few room shots...

That concludes the first night....

More to come!

 

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Here is our thermal image for baggage!

 

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From there it was finally onto 50's Prime Time. We had to get there a little early cause we wanted to add Nick on to our ADR. They allowed for it with no issues at all. Think we had a 5 minute wait or so, so I snapped some pictures of course!

After 50's we headed over to The Great Movie Ride...

 

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Now was the time that we decided to head over to Fantasmic to grab a good seat for the show. We like to sit right in the front row on our own set of bleachers. First though, I got some pictures of The Hollywood Tower Hotel...

Now onto Fantasmic!

 

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The Fantasmic shots are not the greatest being my low light lens does not zoom, and my stock lens is not fast enough, while letting in the light needed to get awesome shots for being so far away...

After Fantasmic ended I knew I wanted to end the night at The Tower of Terror of Terror for obviously riding it, but some pictures as well.

We decided to make our way back to Star Tours for another ride and some night shots of the outside. Once outside Starring Rolls Cafe we saw this dude...

 

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Heading back over towards Rockin Roller Coaster and ToT, we stopped for some photos on the way...

 

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So Rockin Roller Coaster was first...

Then it was ToT where I took many, many pictures being we rode it SEVERAL times before the park closed...

 

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[erstwo]

Wow, wow, wow! Your pictures just get better!

I love those shots of 50's prime time - that mom laughing with her daughter at the table and the waiter working - such great shots, it's almost like I can put myself there. So awesome.

Your Fantasmic shots are great too. Don't sell yourself short! Except for the one with John Smith - that wig is TERRIBLE up close! :lol:

My favorite is that one of Star Tours. My son would love that - it's his absolute favorite right now.

 

[blackthidot]

Wow, wow, wow! Your pictures just get better!

I love those shots of 50's prime time - that mom laughing with her daughter at the table and the waiter working - such great shots, it's almost like I can put myself there. So awesome.

Your Fantasmic shots are great too. Don't sell yourself short! Except for the one with John Smith - that wig is TERRIBLE up close! :lol:

My favorite is that one of Star Tours. My son would love that - it's his absolute favorite right now.

LOL @ John Smith...I had to REALLY crop it to see if HE was a SHE...

Thanks so much for the compliments and for continuing to read/look!

 

[WDW_Princess24]

Just jumping on board, and I gotta say, you take a mean picture! Some of them are pretty mind blowing, especially those HM ones..keep shooting!

I love your random people pics, your comments have me in tears!

 

[Billy6]

I would have totally checked this guy into the wall, if we was running at me like that...:ROFLOL:

Great Report!!

 

[SleepingMonk]

The moobs!

:hurl:

And I think that guy in the back is in his third trimester....hope his water didn't break in the wave pool.

 

[DiPSU224]

Killer photos! Love, love, love the firework shots! I do have to say though, of all the beautiful photos you've taken here, my favorite has to be the child being dragged on the suitcase. I'm not kidding when I say that photo had me cackling for a good couple of minutes.

Looking forward to the rest!

 

[nngrendel]

Is it me or is it just not cool when they have a girl playing the part of the Gangster?? When I think of Gangsters I think of a guy not a girl. Girls having a mobster accent is dumb. Doesn't work for me.
It maybe harsh of me to say this but this actually ruins TGMR for me.

 

[Disneyfalcon]

Great report so far, Jon! I'll agree with everyone, your pictures look great! You really have learned a lot. The lack of any noise on some of those night shots is awesome. What lenses were you using?

Can't wait for more!

 

[blackthidot]

Great report so far, Jon! I'll agree with everyone, your pictures look great! You really have learned a lot. The lack of any noise on some of those night shots is awesome. What lenses were you using?

Can't wait for more!

Thanks! The stock lens that came with the D7000 and I got a 30mm Sigma 1.4.

The dark pictures WITH "noise" are kind of funny because I edited them at work, on my work computer and they look fine. Then I get home and look at the report from my macbook and I can really see the "noise". Pretty annoying but oh well...

 

[Disneyfalcon]

Thanks! The stock lens that came with the D7000 and I got a 30mm Sigma 1.4.

The dark pictures WITH "noise" are kind of funny because I edited them at work, on my work computer and they look fine. Then I get home and look at the report from my macbook and I can really see the "noise". Pretty annoying but oh well...

Okay, everyone seems to love that Sigma. I need to get me one of those!!

I hear you on different computers showing differently. Not to mention the differences in saving for web and editing for print. I'm too lazy to do both most of the time, so one of the two is going to suffer.

Edit: Oh shoot, scratch that. I remember why I ruled it out. It won't work on a full frame and that is my next purchase.

 

[Lynn1030]

Great report! We missed the castle show the last time we were there, the pics look amazing.

I notice between you and Tom, you both have some pretty great shots in MK after it closes. We tried staying late after closing once and we had a cast member following us at about 30 feet back. She never said anything about having to leave and she even offered to snap a shot of us, but it just felt weird having our every move watched. If we were walking, she was walking...if we stopped, she stopped. She stopped following us after we made it past the castle, but at that point, there were still quite a few other people in that area that it was pointless to try to get the "alone in the park" shots. We went there that night specifically to get those shots, with my husbands photo equipment, so it was obvious we weren't trying to do anything bad.

Have you experienced this? The night we tried this, it was a later closing, so I'm wondering if certain closing times are better or if there is some other strategy we need to employ...(like ignoring the stalking cast member?)

 

[blackthidot]

Great report! We missed the castle show the last time we were there, the pics look amazing.

I notice between you and Tom, you both have some pretty great shots in MK after it closes. We tried staying late after closing once and we had a cast member following us at about 30 feet back. She never said anything about having to leave and she even offered to snap a shot of us, but it just felt weird having our every move watched. If we were walking, she was walking...if we stopped, she stopped. She stopped following us after we made it past the castle, but at that point, there were still quite a few other people in that area that it was pointless to try to get the "alone in the park" shots. We went there that night specifically to get those shots, with my husbands photo equipment, so it was obvious we weren't trying to do anything bad.

Have you experienced this? The night we tried this, it was a later closing, so I'm wondering if certain closing times are better or if there is some other strategy we need to employ...(like ignoring the stalking cast member?)

Yep. After we left HM she was standing on like the boarder of Liberty Square and Frontierland. She stayed behind us a good 50 feet. She watched us stand on the bridge and get those Castle shots and stayed once we got across the bridge. I did run back to her and said thanks for being patient and letting me get the shots I wanted. She said no problem and that was that.

And actually the night I met Tom we like, got kicked out of MK!!! Haha they actually escorted us out of the park. So not only do we reek havoc on here...we do it in WDW as well!!! :king: