Disney At Night
Sometimes you may want to get a shot of something and there just isn't enough room for you to backup far enough to get everything into your field of view. This is where wide angle lenses come in.
I've always been intrigued by the horseless carriage outside the Haunted Mansion in the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World. In the past, in order to get the entire carriage, I shot it pretty much straight on from the front, but then you can't see a lot of the carriage. I thought this would be a great opportunity to try out my new wide angle lens.
The camera I use is a Sony A6000 and the focal length I used for this shot is 12mm (18mm @ 35mm equivalent when considering the 1.5x crop factor). Clearly this was a night shot so a tripod was a must to minimize camera shake. On a side note, I heard that Disney no longer allows full size tripods in the park, but I can't validate that. When I go to the park I carry a very small tripod called the DayTrip Mini Tripod made by MeFoto. While this tripod is only 2 feet high when extended to its maximum height, I tend to use them on the many garbage cans Disney has on property to get them to my eye level. This tripod can also get very low so when you are looking for a different perspective, this tripod can also come in handy when you need a tripod only a few inches off the ground. The rest of the camera settings were f/5.6 aperture, a very long 30 second shutter speed (hence the tripod), and ISO 100.
One reason I wanted the long exposure was to try to take out some of the people in the background. Take a look at the stand-by line on the left side of the picture. You can sort of make out people there because they tended to move a little more slowly so the camera still captured them a little. What you can see are the three people that walked directly behind the carriage and the numerous people leaving the exit. These people all moved through the shot within a few seconds. I actually have another version of this picture where some kid walked by with a handheld toy that was lit up. It made a wavy light streak through the picture that was actually a nice ghostly effect.
As far as the location, well you can see for yourself. There is a flower garden directly in front of the carriage so with the 12mm lens I was using, this was the best angle I could find. Maybe you can find another interesting angle.
So there you have it. The location, the camera settings, some thoughts on how to use mini tripods and long exposures. Happy Haunting!