1 week cruise-- anyone regret NOT getting photo usb

nycdisneygal

I went ahead and signed up for another kid!
Joined
Feb 13, 2010
So its $300 to get the photos for a week. If I do decide to do that I will want to get as many pics as possible but I know waiting in line with an 18 month old (our party will be us and our 2 DDs, Dsis and my Dparents). I know I can get the handlers to use our camera for the character greets, but am thinking maybe some other nice pics would be nice.. Not sure $300 nice! How many pics do most people get during a 1 week cruise...
 
I fretted over this same thing. In the end, I bought the package. We aren't 'line up for the characters' people, but we did do formal night and the star wars characters. They also come around the MDRs on a couple of nights. All in all, I got 60 images. There's one with goofy on Castaway Cay, but that's the only non-Star Wars character we have. So if you're lining up for the princesses or Mickey and gang, you'll get a whole lot more than that. 60 images for $300 is $5 a photo.

Also, I figured if I never go on another cruise, I'll have these for memories. Now, only you can decide if this is in your cruise budget, but compared to the price of the cruise, I thought it was worth it to me.
 
I fretted over this same thing. In the end, I bought the package. We aren't 'line up for the characters' people, but we did do formal night and the star wars characters. They also come around the MDRs on a couple of nights. All in all, I got 60 images. There's one with goofy on Castaway Cay, but that's the only non-Star Wars character we have. So if you're lining up for the princesses or Mickey and gang, you'll get a whole lot more than that. 60 images for $300 is $5 a photo.

.

hhmmm interesting thanks...We will do characters. We usually get well over 100 pics 1 week at WDW (for only 130!). Ok... Well will keep thinking... :)
 
We have been on 4 cruises and have never bought the photo package. The character handlers will use your phone/camera, and with preschool aged kids, we didn't want to line up for formal photos. The dining room pictures always look awful to me. On our cruises, we've bought a total of 2 photos from Shutter. I'd rather have $300 to spend on drinks, food, and bingo than the photo package!
 


We did the photo book as well but I didn't think the quality of the pictures was nearly as good as the actual pictures.
 
We did a 4 night and didn't get it but wished I had. We didn't buy any on the ship and I regret that.
 


I never see this mentioned here as an option, but my TA gifted us a smaller package - 10 photos of your choosing, not unlimited, but only $100-something. That worked well for us. To put it bluntly - DS8 can be a real jerk about having his photo taken. I have no idea what his problem is, but he's been like this since around the age of 3. I can coerce him into a few special shots over the course of a vacation, but otherwise he is either not in the photos or ruining it with his expression. It's not worth the annoyance on both our parts to get him in more photos, and there are only so many partial family photos I want. With those 10, the ones we had on our phones that the CMs or we took, and a free shutterfly photo book code - I spent a heck of a lot less than the unlimited photo package even if I had purchased the package myself, and I had a book at the end. (I also kind of enjoyed doing the shutterfly book myself and adding commentary, etc, and printed 2 copies so my parents could have one too.)

Maybe only TAs can buy this package though? Or maybe people just think if they're going to spend that much, might as well buy the unlimited. idk. But when it came down to choosing the 10 photos, there was really no struggle to pick the best 10. Not sure I would have wanted any others, b/c we had the same shots on our phones from the m&gs. There was literally no thought to buying any extra shots.
 
Didn't get it and were fine. Our folder had like 3 photos in it. We just bought the couple we wanted.
 
We got the 10 picture package. You take the USB home then you can look at the photos and decide which ones you want. I still wonder if its worth the price. The ones they take on my camera normally turn out pretty well.
 
If you pre-purchase the package, you get a discount. There's no discount on board if you decide you want it. However, if you get on board and you end up on the last night and you look at the photos and say, "Meh" you can get a full refund. If you love them and want the package but you didn't pre-purchase, you're paying full price.
 
I bought the package in advance and planned to cancel on board on just use my Nikon DSLR. When I started comparing the quality of my camera to the ones that the photographers took, I decided to keep the package. They bring in lots of external lighting and it makes everything look so nice. I could not compete with my camera. We were on 14 nights and had 390+ pictures. I have used about 30 or 40 of the pictures for various purposes (Christmas Card, framed, family members picked one, etc. I am glad we bought it. I was very diligent in checking the computers to make sure all of our pictures ended up in our folio each day.
 
They don't like talking about refunds, either. I asked about it on my first day, and they redirected me to all the wonderful features of their products. They never did confirm if I could outright cancel. I actually ended up buying the photos for another $100 on the last night. No, I don't know what I'll do with them, but they are nice.
 
Ah yes I see the 10 photo package... Gee 150 for 10 pics! Ok. Well I guess we can get refund if we hate them. Or just try really hard to take good pics with our camera!
 
We've never purchased the full package, just a few select prints. No regrets.

And with a party that size you are aware you'll need 2 packages? The Shutters photo package is by stateroom, not traveling party. There is an offer that if 1 stateroom purchases the package then the 2nd stateroom can purchase at a discount.

Enjoy your vacation!
 
We've never purchased the full package, just a few select prints. No regrets.

And with a party that size you are aware you'll need 2 packages? The Shutters photo package is by stateroom, not traveling party. There is an offer that if 1 stateroom purchases the package then the 2nd stateroom can purchase at a discount.

Enjoy your vacation!

Any pics with the second stateroom will also have my kids (in my stateroom)--- so I thought those would be included in mine/ Is that not correct? My parents are not going to have Shutters pics with just the two of them!
 
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If you only want pics with your kids, yes any pics with grandma/grandpa/auntie will be included. But any pictures of the others without a member of your stateroom will not be included. I wanted to make sure you weren't thinking it was a package that would include all pics of everyone/anyone in your party.

Enjoy your cruise!
 
I'm going to resurrect this thread since it isn't so old and is along the exact lines I'm questioning.

On our last 4-night Bahama cruise, we only had 7 or 8 pictures in our folder at the end of the week. None from any dinners, none at Castaway Cay (didn't even see any photographers there!), no candids, only character meet and greets. I didn't even see the photo from us getting on the ship! What did we miss/do wrong?? I am SUCH a picture person.

We will be going on the 7-night Western Caribbean next November and I was contemplating purchasing a digital package, will I be able to view all available photos before the disembarkation day? If there aren't enough photos for me to justify the package, can I cancel and just buy individuals or a smaller package?

I hope this makes sense!!
 
I'm going to resurrect this thread since it isn't so old and is along the exact lines I'm questioning.

On our last 4-night Bahama cruise, we only had 7 or 8 pictures in our folder at the end of the week. None from any dinners, none at Castaway Cay (didn't even see any photographers there!), no candids, only character meet and greets. I didn't even see the photo from us getting on the ship! What did we miss/do wrong?? I am SUCH a picture person.

We will be going on the 7-night Western Caribbean next November and I was contemplating purchasing a digital package, will I be able to view all available photos before the disembarkation day? If there aren't enough photos for me to justify the package, can I cancel and just buy individuals or a smaller package?

I hope this makes sense!!


I am wondering the same thing. I think you can just buy individual but not sure. Maybe someone will know...
 

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