A Different View at Disney Springs

Nighttime at Disney Springs

During our June 2018 Florida trip, we made a few visits to Disney Springs at Walt Disney World, as we often do. For you old-timers, you might know the area as Downtown Disney. Or maybe the Disney Village Marketplace. Or even Lake Buena Vista Village if you go way back. I’m not saying you are (or I am) old or anything if you remember the old Lake Buena Vista Village days, but it would probably be true.

Anyway, there have been lots of changes to the area over the last few years. And not just name changes, either. Lots of new things have been added, and lots of old things have been reworked. We enjoy some of the stores, and we pass up other stores, but that’s okay. Everyone can’t like everything, right?

In this view above, the Coca-Cola Store on the right is relatively new, opening up a couple of years ago. And Planet Hollywood at the center has had a major facelift recently, too. We actually did not go in either of those this time around. Yes, that’s right - I did not go in the Coca-Cola Store. But they don’t give away the stuff for free in there, you know. Whenever we would park in the Orange garage (yes, parking garages are relatively new, too, if you haven’t been there in a while), we would enter the area from the garage at this point. As we were going back to the car one night, I thought this was a nice view, so I captured it on film. Or rather pixels, because who uses film anymore?

I enjoyed the nighttime colors and atmosphere, and this captures the feeling of being there pretty well for me. And as you can see, it was not overly crowded at night, which was nice, too. Now that most of the major construction has ended, the walkways are all open and don’t seem as crowded as they did during the most recent construction phases. I’m happy about that.

A Different View

Frequent Burnsland visitors may notice that this is not a super-wide-angle fisheye view. Most all of the recent photos have been of the fisheye variety, and I do still enjoy that really wide view. But I switched to the 25mm prime lens to take advantage of the f/1.8 aperture for some low light shots, and I decided to leave it on the camera for a while.

Although many of our past trips have been primarily photographed with the fisheye lens, that was reduced a bit for this trip. This time around, I ended up with close to a 50-50 split between the fisheye and prime lenses, with a few other photos from the 14-42mm zoom lens when there was a need for that.

There were a few reasons for the change. For one thing, many of my photos were starting to look really similar to those from the past few Florida trips, so I thought it would be nice to have something a little different. Why post the same thing, or very similar things, over and over again? 

Also, using a different lens caused me to look at things a little differently. With the fisheye lens, I can mainly point the camera in the general direction of what I am trying to capture and get all of it in the frame. And everything else in that general area, too. But with the prime lens and its fixed focal length, I have to plan things out a little more. And sometimes I have to back up to get more of what I want in the frame. Or sometimes I just decide I like not having everything in the frame.

With this Disney Springs photo, the latter was the case. You can see most of Planet Hollywood and a good bit of the Coca-Cola Store, but not all of them. And that was fine with me because it was something different. Maybe not necessarily abstract or anything like that, but focusing just a little more on some of the details than on the entire view. I also liked how the lens put the two buildings together, even though they are not right on top of each other as this may make them seem to be.

Sometimes, changing how you look at things is a good thing. A different perspective can make you start to notice details that you had not seen before. It can cause you to take a fresh look at things that you have been seeing over and over again, which can be good.

We sometimes need a fresh perspective on our lives, on our situations, on our relationships. When things such as that get to be familiar, they can almost seem boring. But a different view on things can make us more thankful for what we have. Maybe that comes from seeing some of the difficulties that others face in their lives. Maybe that comes from someone giving us some fresh advice that we had not considered before. Or perhaps it might come from facing some difficulties or new situations together. Maybe that fresh perspective can come from changing the name of a shopping center, too. I guess that is why they keep changing it.

Take some time to look for a fresh perspective on things. It might make you even more appreciative of what you have.

Bible Verse

We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God: those who are called according to His purpose. - Romans 8:28

About the Photo

A good bit has already been said about this photo, so here are a few technical details.

Although the aperture on this lens opens all the way to f/1.8, I had it set to f/2. And because of that (almost)  wide-open setting, I was able to use a shutter speed of 1/40 at ISO-800. That was a fast enough speed for a handheld photo without needing a tripod. And I was also able to keep the ISO low enough that there was no major noise present in the photo, as sometimes happens with higher ISO values. Also, because some of the lights were rather bright, I had the exposure bias set to -0.3 to compensate for that brightness. As has been previously mentioned, the only focal length available for this lens is 25mm, so there wasn’t anything else to choose from there.

For this photo, I only did some minor processing in Photoshop to brighten things up just a little while keeping the highlights under control. Sometimes those photos that you don’t have to do much work to are the fun ones.

Photo: A single Raw exposure, processed in Photoshop. Read more about photography tips, photo software, camera gear, and more at Steve’s Photography Tips.
Camera: Olympus OM-D E-M10
Lens: Olympus M.Zukio 25mm f1.8
Date: June 11, 2018
Location: Disney Springs, Walt Disney World, Florida