Tilt-Shift

 "Come with me and you'll be in a world of pure imagination..."

I've often enjoyed playing with the tilt-shift setting on my camera, and I thought it would be fun to apply the effect to some Disneyland images. Some of the results were better than others, but I hope you enjoy them. Looking at an already scaled-down world with a "miniature" filter lets you see the park in a different light!

Though we never got to ride the Submarine Voyage, we watched the subs ply the lagoon during testing, and I feel like the kinetic energy this adds is part of why the ride is important. Hopefully whenever I get back to Disneyland, the attraction is still operating.

Watching the train approach the New Orleans Square station may be one of my favorite views in the park. Who doesn't love the little historic depot? I can't remember for sure if they ever ran four trains while we were there, but I was impressed by even three at once.

I'm surprised that Disneyland still has turnstiles when so many parks have done away with them. I wonder how old these particular turnstiles are at Small World. This exit wouldn't be built today with ADA accessibility in mind!

Casey Jr. is peak Disneyland charm. Storybook Land has plenty of candidates for tilt-shift photos, though I feel like I could capture new scenes with an even more convincing effect.

I remember this ride on Casey Jr. in the early morning light fondly, seeing a guide in training on the canal boats. I am so happy that these wonderful vintage ride vehicles continue to operate without safety modifications.

Seeing both the Mark Twain and Columbia operating at once was such a happy sight for me. The Columbia had a relatively limited capacity compared to the Mark Twain, so you had to time it just right if you wanted to ride it. The little boy inside of me wishes I could be the guy operating the cannon!

Returning to Frontierland aboard the Columbia, the Golden Horseshoe beckons. Though there isn't a full show anymore, during our visit there was a piano player. (Now, there apparently is no entertainment at all.)

I swear that the Cherry Coke I drank sitting on the upper level of the Golden Horseshoe was the best-tasting Cherry Coke I've ever had, but that was probably affected by where I was drinking it.

I love the yellow umbrellas in front of the Jolly Holiday Bakery Cafe (former Plaza Pavilion) and the fringe umbrellas around the Hub. They seem like something you'd see in the park during the 60s to me for some reason.

Either the tilt-shift effect is working, or Main Street just looks miniature on its own. It looks like someone will need to duck to enter the shop! But if he wants to visit the Silhouette Studio, it was still temporarily closed in 2022.

I remember glancing at this sign and believing it, then when I was looking at my pictures I thought "wait a minute..." Clever theming (or lying)!

Happy to see the mailbox hails from the great state of Pennsylvania!

When Main Street isn't crowded, a ride on the Horse-Drawn Streetcar sounds like a wonderful idea. Or you can just sit on the bench and look at a park map to plan your next ride...

Fortunately, there are lots of open benches from which to choose! I'm guessing that these small trees replaced older, larger ones that made it more difficult to see the castle.

Though the cannons have been moved out of the walkway into the adjacent planters, they still herald a patriotic theme that is appropriate for Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln.

No "tilt-shift" nonsense here, just a cannon in its full glory (albeit plugged up).

While we're at it, let's take that plug off and shoot that cannon right down Main Street! We'll only hit a couple people.

No matter what happens at Disneyland, this will always be the prettiest entrance of any park anywhere, in my opinion! And it's not even close.

Ok, shooting the cannon now might not be as good of an idea as it was in the previous picture where the street was largely empty. I took this picture from the Omnibus, or I was standing on the shoulders of my 7-foot-tall dad. I can't really remember...

Why ride the Horseless Carriage when you can rent a hoseless, electric scooter of your own! Yee haw! (Yeah, I'm running out of ideas...) I think the brick border on the streetcar tracks is an improvement over how it was, but I can see how people would be nostalgic for the old look.

The last time the Main Street Electrical Parade ran was during its 50th anniversary in 2022. Hopefully it returns someday, though I can see how some people might see it as tired. This is an image I posted previously, but I couldn't resist using the tilt-shift effect on it. 

I can appreciate my rides on Splash Mountain all the more now that the conversion to the new theme is largely complete. I have a feeling that Disneyland's Splash Mountain will not only always be the best log flume I've experienced but one of the best dark rides too. I love the melancholy look of this shot, as the sun was setting on the attraction's tenure at the park.

Here's one shot from DCA. I love the lights for this restaurant in Paradise Gardens Park. They evoke an old turn-of-the-century "electric park" perfectly. With the lights on Golden Zephyr across the way, the effect was as close as I could get to being at an early 1900s amusement park today.

And now for a few completely different shots! These are from Story Book Forest at Idlewild Park in Ligonier, PA, a self-contained fairytale park with no rides. These are the original shots taken with the built-in tilt-shift effect on my camera that convinced me to do this post. That's Snow White's cottage in the background (its chimney has seven multicolored stacks).

Story Book Forest has the Seven Dwarfs, but it is also home to the generic "elves of the forest." Here's one of the bunch.

Finally, this is Laffland at Sylvan Beach Amusement Park in New York, a delightful old dark ride that is pretty much a perfect time capsule of the 1950s like the park itself. If all goes according to plan, I will be riding this ride this coming Friday. After dark, I love how the sign is illuminated and the clowns are shrouded in the shadows.

I feel like the tilt-shift thing is kind of hit-or-miss, but I hope that didn't take away from the photos. I'll have more to come on Disneyland and other parks in the future! I'm very busy "working" at Kennywood (it's mostly fun), but I hope to get another post out by the end of July.

April First - a post in two parts

Happy April Fools Day! I have decided that I will indeed post every picture from our California trip, no matter how bad. ;-) (I also found some extra pictures that may be good candidates for a future post.) I'm going to end this post with some more Kennywood memories, so feel free to read what you want! 

Let's start out with this high-quality picture of the Timber Mountain Log Ride:Next is this slightly dark image of the Primeval World Diorama. If you squint, you may be able to make out the brontasauruses (seriously).

I have no clue how I skipped over this picture-perfect image on the Disneyland Railroad when I went through all my pictures the first time. But here it is in all its glory for you to enjoy:

While taking pictures of the Three Fences, I noticed a submarine on the prowl through the trees on the right, and I had to grab a picture. Compared to the other pictures, this one is only 95% bad!

Most of my Haunted Mansion pictures are feasts for the eyes. Take this example of Madame Leota:

I think I am the happiest person to ever get his picture taken with an Adventureland trash can.

I might just be the no. 1 Haunted Mansion photographer of all time.

Sometimes, you just want to get on Big Thunder Mountain so bad that you have to use your ninja skills to summon the train. Or something.

My dad took this picture because he was fascinated by this old tree, and it is pretty cool!

What did I take a picture of this pot of stew on the Columbia? Because it was rad.

My picture of Max, Buff, and Melvin in Winnie the Pooh didn't turn out too great, but at least I got the shot.

BLAM!

And to end, here's a picture that's not bad by itself, but since you may have seen a similar angle millions of times before, I'll just leave it here. The Mark Twain.

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Here are some more Kennywood memories to finish out this post because I didn't include everything in "part 1" two months ago, and I enjoy typing this stuff out!

The kiddie Ferris wheel is one ride that many people dread operating, but I didn't mind it on the couple of occasions I operated the ride. Even though you have to crouch to help kids buckle their seatbelts, the task of balancing the wheel keeps things interesting, and it's funny seeing kids whirl around in the cage-like cars.

For Kennywood's Halloween event, the park's midways are covered with a thick blanket of fog. This photo is looking across the lagoon for the Pittsburg Plunge with the Phantom's Revenge and SwingShot in the background.

In the summer, the lagoon is covered with fountains, and it's one of my favorite spots in the park. 

This picture shows a large reason why the Racer is my all-time favorite ride: I love the design of its station from 1927. They don't build coaster stations like this anymore!

My favorite spiel at this ride would be "When I say 'race,' you say 'er!'" So everyone would sound clueless saying "errrrrrr...." as the train dropped out of the station.

The ride in the foreground is the "Pittsburg Plunge," (old spelling of Pittsburgh), and it was one of the first rides I operated. Since it's a typical shoot-the-chute ride where you get drenched, the majority of riders were overly excited pre-teens, and there were a lot of shenanigans. Every time you told the riders to "exit to the right," they would without fail jump out to the left and look around like they were completely confused. 

At my orientation in early 2022, we had to sit through a three-hour-long PowerPoint presentation that relied heavily on 2000s-era clip art. One slide had a picture of a military tank representing no weapons, and the presenter told us, "Don't bring your tank to work." No one laughed. 

Here's a snow-covered Jack Rabbit, which is set in one of the park's ravines. Opened in 1920, the Jack Rabbit is the oldest ride operating at Kennywood. I hope you enjoyed this off-kilter post!

National Museum of American History

Happy New Year! Though my grandparents live only an hour and a half from Washington DC, I have only been to the nation's capital twice. Both of these were summer days above 90 degrees, so we spent more time sheltering in the various museums instead of walking around the city. The first museum I ever visited in DC was the National Museum of American History, and it's still one of my favorites. This post is not a representation of all that DC has to offer, just a look at the theme park-related artifacts in the Museum of American History. But I don't want to come across as distilling such a serious and complex museum into the trivial topic of theme parks! I just want to showcase the most interesting aspects that are related to this blog's theme. :-)

The Herbert C. Hoover Building houses the White House Visitor Center and is the former home of the National Aquarium, but it is most notable as the location of the US Department of Commerce.

The Capitol Building is partly hidden by a cloud of humidity, but I mainly wanted to capture the Post Office building on the right. Built in 1891, I believe that its tower and general design are directly copied from Pittsburgh's Allegheny County Courthouse, which was completed in 1888 and sparked legions of imitations.

We have arrived at the museum!

I instantly bypassed every other (less important) artifact in the museum to visit Kermit the Frog and Sam. Along with Dorothy's Ruby Slippers, the original Muppets sit at the entrance to the museum's new "Entertainment Nation" exhibit.

The collection is obviously a sight to behold, with everything from Prince's guitar to Archie Bunker's chair, but I'll just leave you with a picture of this original Steamboat Willie sketch from 1928.

This 15-foot-tall stained glass window of RCA mascot Nipper was originally part of the RCA Tower in Camden, NJ. The building has been converted into condominiums but still features large windows identical to this one, so I believe this window is an original that was replaced. It appears that the building has had three sets of windows over the years.

Lincoln's tophat is something that everyone knows is in this museum, and I have to include a picture of it in this post. Lincoln wore this tophat on the night of his assassination.

Built in 1831, the John Bull locomotive is one of the museum's most treasured artifacts. It even made a visit to the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition because it was still historic 130 years ago!

In 1981, the Smithsonian famously revived the locomotive once again, allowing it to claim the title of oldest operable steam locomotive in the world. Perhaps they will attempt that again someday...

The museum even included a small temporary exhibit on the Disney parks. No large artifacts were displayed, but I was still happy to see this.

The exhibit uses Disneyland and Walt Disney World to examine wider American history, culture, and values. These "map panes" flip over to reveal text on the other side, but they needed WD-40 bad!

This old Magic Kingdom map was displayed next to a vintage Disneyland Fun Map, and I love how Tomorrowland is startlingly sparse compared to the west side of the park. Soon Space Mountain would fill the void!

It appears that the curators allowed people to submit their old family photos for inclusion in the display.

I have a neighbor who visited Walt Disney World in 1976, and she still remembers all the details of America on Parade. Unfortunately, they failed to include the "People of America" and their oversized heads in this pennant!

The exhibit was mostly just ephemera, but there were a few pieces of artwork. Here is a World's Fair souvenir record and a complimentary ticket for Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln.

The strip of Disneyland Railroad tickets is pretty neat, especially since it lists a never-built Holidayland station as a stop. I would have a hard time surrendering these detailed tickets for a ride on the Railroad! 

Out of view of this shot, the "Adventureland to Frontierland" ticket says "no shooting buffalo from train," and the "Main St. to Adventureland" ticket reads "elephants check trunks with baggageman." Adventureland Station?! I'm confused.

It is pretty amazing that we live in a time when a Splash Mountain poster from 1992 is worthy of display behind glass in the Smithsonian Institution.

Fess Parker's Davy Crockett coonskin cap is placed alongside a charming piece of Mary Blair concept art in this case.

I don't know how rare this ticket is, but it's a neat souvenir.

"Vice President Nixon" took a carefree joyride on the TWA Moonliner on August 11, 1955, less than a month after the park opened. That's kind of prophetic I guess! This display case also contained a model of the Moonliner.

Given the theme of the exhibit, this souvenir from the Hall of Chemistry was presented with a plaque explaining how Monsanto was thought of differently in the 1950s.

Every sign and label in the exhibit was presented in both English and Spanish.

The exhibit explores how Pirates of the Caribbean has changed over time, and it features this Marc Davis sketch that crystallizes what was different about the Pirates ride of 1967 compared to today.

I do not know who drew this sketch, but it shows Benjamin Franklin's print shop in the American Adventure at EPCOT, an element that apparently did not make it into the final version of the show.

Different examples of patriotic souvenirs were included in the display as well, as the Town Square flat retreat is a tradition at both Disneyland and Walt Disney World.

In any case, it was not the most impressive exhibit by any means (especially compared to everything else in the museum), but I still got a lot of enjoyment out of it.

Here's an example of how the museum overwhelms you with amazing artifacts: Davy Crockett's "ceremonial hatchet" next to a large axe used in the 1860 election. Other examples are William Clark's compass, Teddy Roosevelt's chaps, FDR's Fireside Chat microphone, and the pen LBJ used to sign the Civil Rights Act, all in the same display case!

To finish, here are some shots of the impressive America on the Move exhibition (sponsored by General Motors). You may have noticed that every picture so far in this post can be connected to the Disney parks in some way... :-)

The exhibit includes many lifelike static figures that I admittedly took for real people on a few occasions.

In some ways, it's a tad unsettling... but still cool!

There's even a mock-up of a station on the Chicago L in addition to many other tableaux. I hope you enjoyed this quick trip through the National Museum of American History, and know that there is so much more than what I chose to showcase in the post! Like the original Star Spangled Banner from 1814 (strictly no photos allowed)! It goes without saying that this is a museum that is definitely worth a visit for anybody.