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Sunday, May 26, 2013

Disneyland 24 Hour Opening & Night Shoot

so i wait until a 3-day weekend to get my first post in awhile in. Still feel like there's a lot on my plate but this will suffice for now...

Jist of things: Disneyland is promoting the new "Monsters University" movie, openning June 21st. For that, they opened the park up for a full 24 hours, Friday 24th @ 6am to Saturday 25th @ 6am. I purchased a discounted parkhopper pass almost a year ago and hadn't found a time to use it just yet. When it comes to fun activities, I prefer to arrive early and leave early. Seeing that a standard day at disneyland usually lasts 10am-9pm and my last jaunt was 4 years ago w/ an ex, there was really only one or two things I wanted to see. But the biggest thing to look forward to was night photography.


Disneyland, like the few ballparks and festivals i've been to, would have camera rules. I've read forum posts about uninformed security guards, gatecheckers that wouldn't know the rules posted with what they believe is "acceptable". Luckily, my clamps have never provided me with any trouble in any location. As much as I looked around the map, the only areas that were truely appealing for me were Tomorrowland and the border of Matterhorn/Finding Nemo ride. Yes, other areas probably offered a vibrant amount of color, but I simply didn't want to shoot such a childish subject landscape.

Here are a few shots from both California Adventure and Disneyland. In addition to night photography, i tend to do long shutter zooms to provide a different perspective. I'd say half were handheld, the other half w/ my clamp-pod or tripod. Settings were usually ISO100, shutters from 0"5 to 6", and f/5.6-8.0.

As usual, no photoshops and minimal contrast corrections - however at this time all pics were done with no alterations since I've yet to find time to install Microsoft Office back onto my new computer build.

The castle, made a bit spooky

Water & lights make the best combination for long shutter 

The above shot, zoomed

 Star Tours, after they re-did it with 3D. Doesn't make sense how we board an imperial shuttle from Episode 5, exit a firefight, then time travel back to the beginning of Episode 3....

Matterhorn seen from Tomorrowland 

Space Mountain had a 2hr wait, and I was never interested in Captain EO. That thing's 30 years old! 



Guess since Disney bought out Lucasfilms, they can have the Skywalker siblings pose like this... 

 Matterhorn at Night, done w/ a clamp-pod on the Nemo attraction fence

Nemo attraction; this was actually interesting to see multiple lights and currents swirling the final image 

Much tougher shot to get since the seagulls kept on moving around. Utilized initial flash with a 8-second exposure follow-up 

Submarine going into the waterfall 

Astroblaster ride 

Long exposure of it spinning; reminds me of the new "Star Trek" transporter beam 

Main Street at 3AM 

A nod to the olden years when people came here to buy film when their camera ran out. No idea what it sells now... 

Coffee was in high demand, as was a good place to rest 

Off to California Adventure for the first time! Sadly, the took out the giant Golden Gate Bridge and the letters 

Marching band from Monsters University 

Impromptu shot of backlit balloons and a full moon in the background 

Mad T Party, which definitely is more 18+ themed

Felt like Coachella, all over again 

Backlit heads in the audience provided an interesting zoom 

Nice touch on the ears

DJ waves hi

 

Apparently this area used to be Tron-themed. So disappointed I missed out on that! 

What some people feel like after leaving this attraction 

This zoom was particularly difficult, since it was handheld and the center focus needed to be directly at Mike's pupil 

 A better version, but still needs practice

This had sort of a old-time feeling, especially lit at night

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