Pros and Cons of picture packages on cruise

[Charlies_Mommy]

Hello all-
24 days and counting till our 1st Disney cruise. So, looking for advice on these picture packages. They are like crazy expensive! Blows me away. Need advice on whether it is worth it or not. I can order it before the cruise and save 10%, but then cancel it if I don't like the pictures? can anyone tell me how many you get (approximately). We are doing a 7 night cruise (merrytime).

Thank you

 

[PrincessShmoo]

Hello all-
24 days and counting till our 1st Disney cruise. So, looking for advice on these picture packages. They are like crazy expensive! Blows me away. Need advice on whether it is worth it or not. I can order it before the cruise and save 10%, but then cancel it if I don't like the pictures? can anyone tell me how many you get (approximately). We are doing a 7 night cruise (merrytime).

Thank you

You can purchase the unlimited digital package (no maximum number of photos) as well as specific number photo packages (10 or 20, for example). There are people who get upwards of 200 photos on the unlimited package.

If you pre-purchase a package, and then find you're not going to get enough photos to make the cost "worth it", yes you can cancel the package onboard. As long as you do it by the last full day of the cruise. Also, the prepurchase price is a 15% savings over buying it onboard. There's the 15% discount on the 20 photo package precruise, as well.

Individual photos cost $19.95 for 8X10 size and $14.95 for 6X8 size.

 

[Pandafamily]

We were planning on buying the photo package of 20 photos, but when were on the ship we could not pick just 20 so we bought the unlimited package while on the ship. I regret not pre-purchasing the package to save some money, and taking a few more pictures while on board.

With the unlimited package you are buying the rights to print your photos when you get back home, so you can print as many pictures as you want.

 

[lklgoodman]

Years ago we got something like 10 free pics through a deal with a travel agent we used. They were OK pics, but I wouldn't have spent a lot of money of them. We don't get the photo deal because really the only time we've had the photographers take our pics are at the character greetings and when they come around during dinner on the first night. You can take your own camera and have them take pics of you at the character greetings including the character breakfast, this is what we do. I don't really care about getting my pic done by them while I'm trying to eat. We've never been out and about on the ship and had our pic taken by the photographers. I always carry my camera with me while doing stuff so I can just take my own pics.

 

[wanderlust7]

We bought the unlimited photo package in advance on our first DCL cruise. But after looking at the photos and comparing to the ones we had on our phones, we had most of them, so decided to cancel. I felt like the main difference was the Frozen ones in Animator's Palate where the lighting is hard to get right. If you cancel, you need to do it onboard by the last night. My refund didn't go through for some reason and I had to follow-up by e-mail, but otherwise it went smoothly.

It's no risk, but the main con for us is we have a tendency to want to get our money's worth. So since we had the package, we felt like we should go to more character meets for more photos. Which contributed to trying to do too much (you can't do it all).

 

[panda123]

We've got two kids, now 7 and 3.
We didn't get a package at all on our first cruise. We had cast members help us take pics with our cameras when we wanted to capture the whole family at the character meets and otherwise I or my husband would take pics. We got a lot of great pictures.
We decided to try the unlimited package on our second cruise and didn't regret it.
Major factors for us:
the dress-up/casual family picture opportunities were included. Got a lot of great pictures, although some of the photographers were much better at helping to get great pics and others just seemed to be meeting a quota.
We got great pics from castaway cay, playing on the beach with the whole family, which we wouldn't have gotten otherwise.
With the kids still young, they were very much into doing any and all character meets, so even though we could get a few of our own, the lighting and framing are generally better.
We ended up with over 200 pics for the week.

 

[havaneselover]

Biggest con for us is the borders. I hate them!

Biggest pro is getting over 100 family pictures for $300 or so. I use them for Christmas cards, canvas prints, photo books, etc.

 

[Marc D]

We usually get the picture book. We found we weren’t looking at the printed pictures after getting home and storing them was a hassle. With the picture book, you select the best ones and the souvenir is more convenient to go back to. Of course, we take gazillions pictures with our phones and store them on Google photos.

 

[RebelHawk]

In five DCL cruises we have purchased one photo but we're not big on photos of us. Instead we take hundreds of photos of where we are and what we're seeing. Our tag line is generally "We don't need a photo taken, we know what we look like".

 

[RedStars]

We did the picture package on the first cruise and most of them are still sitting in the folder they came home in (3 years later). I prepaid for the package for our next cruise but I'm going to check out the pictures onboard and possibly switch to a lower package.

I'd like a couple for the Christmas card, but I definitely don't need 300 more 'posed' pics. If there were some candids, etc, I'd be much more willing to spend the money. There's only so many 'stand as a family and look over here' pics before they all look the same.

 

[ludari]

Personally I believe that if you take a lot of photos, have a family or you don't cruise that often with Disney it might be worth it purchasing the picture package. For me as a single cruiser I usually compare the photos castmembers have taken with my phone/camera to the professional ones. If they are close I don't purchase them but typically I might purchase three or four individual pictures.

 

[Charlies_Mommy]

Thank you everyone! Not sure what to do. will keep chewing it over. Thanks!

 

[cmph]

Our TA gifted us a package that allowed us to pick 10 photos. Honestly, it wasn't a hard decision to narrow it down. Most of the photos we had on one of our Iphones as well. And my youngest hates having his picture taken, so we didn't stop and stand in every line possible. I think you'll get your money's worth if you really make a point of going to the m&gs, getting in line on formal night to pose with the Captain, and have cooperative family members who will pose! I'm always shocked how many photos people will say they had taken. Unless we count the shots of some other random blond kid that the facial recognition system thought was my son - we were well under 100 total.

But - it's no risk, really, so you might as well pre-purchase and cancel if it doesn't end up worth it.

 

[darnheather]

I love the photos! The only down-side is getting ready a bit early for dinner or making the kids stay after dinner for formal photos.

 

[ValentineJulie]

In five DCL cruises we have purchased one photo but we're not big on photos of us. Instead we take hundreds of photos of where we are and what we're seeing. Our tag line is generally "We don't need a photo taken, we know what we look like".

I have ALWAYS felt this same way until I lost my mom on May 26th of this year. Please trust me when I say this........take pictures, lots of them with you and your family. I have hardly any pictures in recent years of my mom, much less of my mom with me or my son

 

[ciniminis]

If you pre-purchase a package, and then find you're not going to get enough photos to make the cost "worth it", yes you can cancel the package onboard. As long as you do it by the last full day of the cruise.

I believe this was the case when we were on a DCL cruise last year (Sep 2016) - but may have changed now. On our more recent DCL cruise (Sep 2017), they had all the USB sticks for pre-orders already loaded and ready for pickup the evening of the last full day of the cruise.

I did appreciate not having to go to Shutters to pick up mine on the morning of debarkation day, but not sure if they'd still let you cancel on the last full day - the deadline may be earlier now, since they're fulling the orders earlier?

 

[PrincessShmoo]

I believe this was the case when we were on a DCL cruise last year (Sep 2016) - but may have changed now. On our more recent DCL cruise (Sep 2017), they had all the USB sticks for pre-orders already loaded and ready for pickup the evening of the last full day of the cruise.

I did appreciate not having to go to Shutters to pick up mine on the morning of debarkation day, but not sure if they'd still let you cancel on the last full day - the deadline may be earlier now, since they're fulling the orders earlier?

I could be wrong (don't really understand all things computer-related), but if an order that would involved a USB stick gets cancelled, can't they just reuse the stick?

 

[msmama]

Are you going to see many characters? Are you going to make time to get photos taken (including standing in line so you may have to be ready earlier)?

We do as many character meet and greets as possible, we love them. On our first 5 day cruise we had about 70 pictures. On our 11 day cruise, well over 100. Now that the pics come on USB, I prefer that. Scanning them all in from the first cruise wasn't fun.

I make photobooks of all our vacations so the picture are important to me, and I like knowing that I have backup (taken by them, taken by me). I do find that the photographers pretty much only take the posed pics, but if you hand your phone/camera to a CM, they'll take candids if you ask them (and sometimes if you don't).

This time we're taking my mother, so I'll be pre purchasing them again because I know she'll like them. Otherwise, I think since I have so many now, I'd probably switch to just getting the 10-20 package.

 

[Stitch7911]

my wife and i bought the book. we wanted to get the Digital copys but it was not worth the money... the reason was because they only had like 20-30 pics of us. and most were like doubles or triples of the same picture. if its like the WDW where its over 120+ pictures then i can see buying the digitals. but if its only a few, i would say, buy the book and add the pictures you want because you will not pay for doubles and you will get a nice hard back book.

 

[JoeFromSeoul]

We got some beautiful shots of the family from DCL photographers. I'm bite the bullet and purchase the digital copies in advance to save the 15%. If the pictures just don't appeal, or if we think that we are getting the same from our own cameras, I can always cancel before the last day. I'd just prefer to have them at the discount if we decide to keep them...