Disney Fine Art Photography

Hello!

Here in Indiana, it went from winter straight to summer- we really didn’t get much of a spring this year, unfortunately! Spring is my favorite season, and so I did miss the mild weather- but since we had such a long winter this year, the summer weather is making me VERY happy! I hope you all are enjoying being outdoors as much as my family is!

And speaking of outdoors- last November, my husband, son and I tried out the Disney Fine Art Photography service for the first time, where we took family photographs both indoors and outdoors at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort & Spa. I was extremely happy with how they turned out- my main goal was to have a few nice photos to put on our Christmas cards, which we did, and more! Let me lead you through the process of using this service.

(We got several slightly different family photos in this beautiful location at the Grand Floridian)

I first heard about this service while perusing some Disney pages on Facebook. A user had posted the family photographs that they had received after using the service, which they highly recommended. I went onto the Disney Fine Art Photography website (www.disneyfineartphotography.com) to check it out for myself, and was delighted to find that they had some affordable options. The package that we ended up purchasing was the Mini Portrait Session, which is a 20-minute session with a Professional Photographer. We were given a choice of several resorts (I believe that at this time, you may now select any of the resorts for your session), and we chose the Grand Floridian, as this is our favorite resort to visit. This package costs $180 plus tax, and immediately after the session, the images are reviewed with you, and you are given a flash drive with all of the images and a Copyright release. There is a 1-hour photo session as well, but for those of us with younger children, I would recommend the 20-minute session. Even though the 1-hour session includes both a photographer and an assistant, and enhancements to the images, I didn’t expect that my 3-year old would last much longer than 20 minutes, and I was correct. You can see from the image below that he was done taking photos, and he was ready to move on to something more fun!

(This is our son's 'I'M DONE' pose!)

I was given a choice of times to select for our session, and I selected the latest appointment of the day, which on this day, was 4:00pm. I was hoping to avoid the hottest part of the day, as my husband and son do not do well in the heat, and I knew I wanted some outdoor photos taken if it didn’t rain. Unfortunately, as you can see from the photo above, the sun was still BRIGHT at 4:30pm, and so these photos didn’t turn out as I had hoped. In the future, I think I would select a morning session- perhaps this way we’d be able to avoid the glaring sun.

(That Florida sun is BRIGHT!)

We showed up to the Grand Floridian via Minnie Van (read my post all about the new Minnie Van service HERE), and promptly at 4:00pm, our photographer met us at our meeting point, the grand staircase in the lobby of the Grand Floridian. We first had a discussion of what we were looking to get out of the session, which did not count towards our 20-minutes. I wasn’t sure how many locations it was possible to visit in our 20-minutes, but I explained to her that there was a location upstairs that I loved, as well as a few places outdoors that I wanted to try to visit. We also wanted to get a few photos of our gender reveal for social media- I was 16 weeks pregnant on this trip, and our ultrasound would be in just a few short weeks, so we had purchased Mickey and Minnie rattles, and wanted the appropriate image to send to friends and family after our ultrasound. 

(The 'It's A Girl' photo that we did not end up using)

(The 'It's A Boy' photo that we sent to family and friends and posted on social media after my ultrasound)

Per our photographer’s recommendation, we took photos on the grand staircase here at the Grand Floridian. I don’t love that we are higher than the photographer, and I think this made for an unflattering angle- I actually debated sending these photos back to Disney to be retouched- which you may do for a fee (specifically, I wanted them to edit out my double chin)- but ultimately, I decided that I was happy with so many other images, so I left these alone (I also am not liking my awkward poses, and of course, those cannot be edited out!).

(The first photo we took during our session)

(On the Grand Staircase at the Grand Floridian)

The next location was one I chose after seeing photographs in this spot on Pinterest, and I love how the photos turned out! Our photographer was having trouble with the lighting, and so this photo of me is actually a fluke- I was simply waiting for her to find the right settings on her camera, and this is the result of that!

(Waiting for our photographer to find the right settings on her camera)

I love how the family photos in this spot turned out!

(One of my favorites!)

(Another photo that I love)

We quickly headed outside to the next spot that I had hand-picked, and again, I adore these photos!

(A beautiful Florida day)

(My sweet family)

(Love this one!)

This is also where our photographer had chosen to do our gender reveal photos, as seen above- I didn’t have any idea of what I wanted to do with the rattles, and so this was her idea- I absolutely loved how these turned out! She also suggested taking a few maternity photos with my son here, and I think they turned out so well! Our photographer truly had some creative ideas!

(A sweet maternity photo with my son)

(Showing off my son's silly side!)

After we finished in this spot, I asked our photographer if we could go over to one more spot- we only had a few minutes left in our session, but she agreed, and we quickly headed over there. I loved that you could see the castle at Magic Kingdom from this spot, and I was hoping that a monorail would go by while she was photographing us. Unfortunately, the monorail went by as we were finishing. In the second-to-last photo, you can see Camden pointing, and he was pointing at the monorail making its way to the Magic Kingdom. I would actually do another photo session at the Grand Floridian specifically for this photo, but I would be sure to do it in the morning, when the sun would not be in our eyes, as these photos did not turn out well due to the glare in our eyes.

(Camden sees the monorail approaching!)

After our session, we went into the lobby of the Grand Floridian with our photographer, where we sat down and she spent a few minutes uploading the images. She then showed us the photos on her laptop, and we ‘oohed and ahhed’ over the images. She gave us a flash drive with all of our images and a Copyright release, and we parted ways. The entire experience lasted about an hour.

Overall, there were eleven photos that I absolutely LOVE, and several more that I really like (out of 31 total). Since my goal was simply to get a few photos that I really liked for my 2017 Christmas cards, I’d say the photo session was a major win! My husband and I would highly recommend this service for those looking for some beautiful family photos taken on Walt Disney World property. Be sure to check out the Disney Fine Art Photography website for more information, or feel free to email me with questions. Happy Travels!