Let’s get it out of the way and I’ll go ahead and state categorically the Disneyland Tea Cup’s are far superior to the Walt Disney World Tea Cups. The outside view is just absolutely gorgeous in comparison to the steel tent at WDW. Once again with Gregg Cooper as my tour guide we setup and shot the tea cups from a couple different angles. I did my standard bracket along with a ton of various exposure lengths to try and capture something cool with the teacups. I found just a bit of motion blur worked best and so something in the 2 second range was what I liked most.
From this angle, I’m told you used to be able to shoot with the Matterhorn poking out the top adding yet another fun element to the shot. Unfortunately, tree growth has basically killed this shot but maybe they’ll trim them again in the future for a return to photographic glory. Still, even without the Matterhorn backdrop I love the result I got here.
I used 3 total shots, though I could have gotten away with 2. I have an 8 second base exposure, a 2 second exposure for the teacup motion and another 1 second exposure for highlight cleanup on the lanterns. I was really splitting hairs here though as they looked great even without it. Actual editing was pretty simple, a few separate color balance layers, some levels adjustments and a bit of Nik Pro Contrast. Finished off with some sharpening and now who is ready for some tea?