Disney Photography Tips

[MarkBarbieri]

I tried this once before and I'm trying it again. This time, I would like to request that people restrict their posts to this thread to tips, requests for tips, and questions about the tips. Last time we got off into a lot of side discussions that watered down the thread.

So feel free to add your tips, ask for tips, or just read and learn.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Shooting Kids on Rides

Set up your camera so that you get a relatively high shutter speed because you won't be able to hold it steady. This may mean increasing the ISO or opening the aperture wider (lower f-stop number).

Zoom out pretty wide since you will probably have trouble aiming it. You can always crop it down later, but you can't add in something that you missed.

Take a bunch of shots and hope that one of them works.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Shoot Your People

Don't get so hung up on shooting the beautiful sites and shows. Make sure that you take plenty of shots of your kids, spouses, friends, etc. Don't just take those shots where everyone is posed in front of the castle either; get shots of people watching shows, riding rides, etc.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Set the Scene

Take scene setting shots. These shots tell people what the following pictures will be about. For example, here is a shot that tells you that the following shots will be about Fantasmic. You can use this technique on signs for rides and shows. You can also take distance shots of buildings and pavilions. You want your pictures to tell a story about your trip, so make sure that you have some that help set the scene.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Everyone makes mistakes, throw them away

One of my pet peeves is someone showing me their vacation photos without them culling the junk first. Everyone takes bad pictures. Throw them away. Why is that so hard for some people? About 5% of my shots made it into my slideshows. I only kept about 25% of my shots.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Fill the Frame

This was the tip most often repeated to me by the experienced photographers I knew when I started. It means that you should try to fill your entire picture with interesting stuff. All to often people leave large sections of the picture filled with uninteresting or even distracting things.

A classic mistake comes when taking a picture of another person. Your instinct is to look right through the middle of the lens straight into their eyes. That would be great if people's eyes were in the middle of their bodies, but they aren't. So what usually results is an interesting bottom half for the picture and a bunch of wasted space above the person. Instead of putting their eyes in the middle, aim lower so that you fill the picture frame with your subject.

Here's the wrong way:

Here is the picture cropped so that it "fills the frame":

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Take a Few Extras

Nothing annoys me more than spending 5 minutes getting a shot set up and then finding out when I get home that someone blinked during the picture. Aargh! Have you ever tried painting open eyes on a blinker in Photoshop? Not fun.

Remind yourself - it's digital, no one is charging me for shots I don't keep. When you spend time and trouble setting up a shot, take several. Whenever I pose people, I always fire off a quick burst of 3 or more shots.

Throwing mistakes away is much easier than trying to fix shots with flaws. Just make sure that you throw away the extras. No one really wants to look through three shots in a row of the same exact scene.

 

[MOmousefan]

This is just the help I need so thanks Mark. One tip I like is to use a tripod whenever possible. They are a pain to haul around, but really help.

POP Century at night

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Check Your Histogram

Most digital cameras have a little chart called a histogram. The histogram shows you how many pixels you have at different brightness levels. The values on the left edge of the histogram are pixels that are black. The values on the right edge of the histogram are pixels that are white. Your goal is to get an exposure in which all of the pixels fall somewhere in the middle.

This is a good histogram because it doesn't touch either the right or left edge.

This histrogram shows that the picture is overexposed. You see part of the histogram piled up on the right edge. That means that some parts of the picture got too much light and are now just blank white.

This histogram shows that the picture is underexposed. You see part of the histogram piled up on the left edge. That means that some parts of the picture got too little light and are now just featureless black.

Sometimes the range from dark to light in your picture is too big and you can't get everything between the edges. In those cases, it is usually better to keep from hitting the right edge. Dark shadows don't usually hurt a picture as much as bright, white patches.

You cannot avoid bright, white patches in some cases, like bright reflections or having the sun in the picture. In those cases, you have to decide whether you can recompose your picture to avoid the bright spots or whether you are better off just leaving them.

 

[GrumpyOne]

This is a more artistic rule.

Pretend your picture is a tic-tac-toe board, it has lines running through it that have divided the picture into nine squares. You'll notice that the picture is also divided into two sets of thirds. One set left to right, the other set top to bottom.

Try to place interesting things along these lines. Going back to what Mark said about faces, if you have a face filling a frame, the eyes will be about the top third and the mouth about the bottom third.

When shooting a scene, a road could be along the bottom third with tree-tops at the top third.

This doesn't mean you shouldn't have something interesting in the middle of the frame, just that it's generally more artistic that if the only thing in the picture is what's in the middle of the frame, you may way to try moving the subject to one side or the other. Or higher or lower.

In general, try not to let the same part of the scene encompass more than 1/3 of the frame.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

The Rule of Thirds

The rule of thirds helps you make an interesting composition. People have a natural tendency to stick the subject of interest right smack in the middle of the picture. This generally results in a boring picture.

The rule of thirds says that you should divide your picture in to three sections across and three sections up and down. Put the interesting parts of the picture along the lines that divide the sections. The four places where the lines touch are the best places to put interesting parts of the picture.

 

[photo_chick]

Don't obsess over getting the perfect shot. If you do you likely will never be happy with what you shoot. Try to get that great shot when you want to, but if you just can't get it don't stress over it. Just move on. You are on vacation after all!

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Don't Split Your Picture With the Horizon

When you have a strong horizon line in your picture, don't stick it right in the middle of the picture. That leaves the viewer confused as to whether the picture is about the stuff below or above the horizon. If you push the horizon line down the botton third line, it says that this is a picture about stuff above the horizon. If you push the horizon up to the top third of the picture, it says that this is a picture about the stuff below the horizon.

Feel free to go to extremes. If you are taking a shot of a really cool sky, put the horizon down near the very bottom of the picture to really emphasize the sky. If you are taking a picture of a cliff and want to make it feel really tall, have it reach almost to the top of the picture.

Here's an example of getting the horizon wrong. Is this a picture about water or China?

This picture is definitely about Mexico. It's not a very good picture, but at least you know what it's about.

 

[photo_chick]

The rule of thirds is a general design rule and does not just apply to photography! Think about it when you scrap those images too. Also remember as with all design rules, there is a time it is ok to break it.

 

[GrumpyOne]

Going along with taking a few more, if you use aperture priority, shutter priority or full manual modes, take a couple of pictures at settings around the one that you just took. What looked perfectly fine in aperture priority at f/5.6 may look stunning at 5.0.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Use open space as part of your story

When you put your subject to one side in a picture, you've created an open space on the other side. You should usually have your subject looking or moving towards the open space. That tells a story to your viewer about what is going to happen. If your subject is heading towards the short side of the frame, the story is that they are leaving.

In the example below, the motorcycle is on the right and is heading into the open space on the left.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Use your flash on sunny days

Most people think that their flash is just for night pictures. It can also be very useful for filling shadows on sunny days. This is called "fill-in flash."

Often when we take a picture when the sun is bright and overhead, we get dark shadows under people's eyes and hats. Shadows from one person in the picture may obscure another person. Sometimes our subject is in the shade and the background is in the sun. All of these things make for lousy pictures.

When you think you might have a problem with shadows or dark areas in a picture, try taking a shot with your flash to help fill in those areas.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Your Flash Can't Go Forever

I always get a chuckle when someone takes a shot of Cinderella's Castle at night with a flash. That little flash on your camera isn't going to light up that big building from 200 feet away. If you aren't shooting something relatively nearby, don't waste your batteries; shut off your flash.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Request - I'd like to see some good tips with examples on shooting fireworks.

Request - I'd like to see some good tips with examples showing long exposures to capture motion at night.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Wrap That Rascal

There are places at Disney where there is a good risk of getting wet (like Splash Mountain). Rather than leave your camera in your travel bag, bring along a plastic bag from the grocery store. Take all the shots you want until just before splashdown, then shove the camera in the plastic bag to protect it from splashes.