I just love taking photos whilst on vacation. Since getting my first digital camera in 2010 I think I have become a ‘photographic’ nightmare!! It’s just so easy to take as many photos as you want…you can always delete the ones that you don’t want later, right??! Except that in my case I hate deleting them, even the blurry ones hold a little piece of a vacation memory!!

If you’re heading to Walt Disney World and want a few pics of you and the family during your vacation you can use the Disney Photopass service. I didn’t sign up to this concept until 2005 when I finally gave in, accepted a card from a Disney photographer and patiently posed for a few photos in front of the various park landmarks. When I returned home and accessed my Photopass account I think I had only taken about thirty photos and only two were worth ordering! But I do still love those two photos, here’s one of them:

When our 2010 WDW trip finally arrived I knew I was going to make the most of the Photopass service this time. In between these two trips Disney had introduced a pre-order package; whereby you could order a cd of all your photos before your trip at the reduced price of $99. A bargain….if you made sure that you made the most of that cd and filled it with lots of photos!!

And of course that’s what I did!! Every time I saw a Photopass photographer I was there, waving my card in front of them, preparing to strike a pose! When I returned home I was able to add borders and logos, zoom in and crop as many photos as I liked, taking the photograph total to over a hundred.

And it wasn’t until I came home and really looked at all the photos did I realise that one photographer had captured a truly magical Disney moment for me. The moment that after posing with Lotso he started talking to us about my hair…we didn’t even notice that the photographer had kept snapping away and had taken some unique photos for us:

So fast forward to 2012…I’m in mega planning mode and in January I pre-ordered this year’s photo cd. And then a few week’s later I heard rumours that something about Photopass was changing. Well, what about the money I’ve already paid over for my cd?? What if my deal wasn’t any good anymore??

Disney announced that they were introducing Photopass+, a service that would now include photos from select attractions and dining locations, but it would only be available in the parks, costing $199 at WDW. I had always thought that the attraction photos should be included with Photopass so this sounded like a good…but expensive…addition to my vacation! Disney confirmed that if you had already pre-ordered the original Photopass cd then you could upgrade to Photopass+ once you arrived at WDW, so despite protesting at the cost I knew I would end up getting it!

And then over the summer Disney released a pre-order offer for Photopass+, reducing the  cost to $169. They would even send you the additional cd of over 400 stock Disney photos before your vacation. If you had already pre-ordered the original Photopass cd you could again upgrade prior to your vacation.

So with a couple of emails and another payment I’m now the proud owner of a Photopass+ voucher ready for my trip!! And believe me, I am going to be posing for a LOT of pictures to get my money’s worth this time!!!! And of course, I can’t wait to share them with you when I get home!!! Smile and say “cheese”