On-Ride Photo idea

I do wish there were more conveniences in the theme park world. For example, at SFDL, I was required to take my S:ROS photo on Thunder Rapids. Luckily, I didn't get soaked. I think they should give you a ticket so you can pick-up your photo on the way out (just like many parks do with entrance photo greeters). I also like the idea of e-mail/postal mail. I think we'll see some parks use e-mail in the next few years for this purpose.

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My two favorite coasters are named Superman.
Nitro, Gemini, Laser, Ice, Thunder...The American Gladiators!

It'd cost the park a bit for the extra bandwidth it would take to mail hi-rez digital pics, but that's probably a smaller cost per picture than the photo paper and ink that they're buying now...

Certainly is a neat idea... the parks would like it too, 'cause now they've got a big long list of e-mail addresses they can subscribe to their e-newsletter. :)

This is a great idea. Mose people have photo quality printers. The pictures taken on a ride go to a computer. All the op wuold have to do is enter your Email address and hit send.

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The worst day at Cedar Point is better than the best day at work.

CoasterFanMatt: I wouldn't count on the Park's photo being all that high-quality. You should see my Medusa West onride photo. It's horrible. The colors are WAY off (much too green) and they did not have the option of cropping off the two other "random guys" that were sitting next to us.

That's BASIC photoshop stuff that I could have corrected myself instead of relying on whatever system of color correction is in place at the park.

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Nothing... NOTHING... can prepare you for... the Fourth Dimension!

"It'd cost the park a bit for the extra bandwidth it would take to mail hi-rez digital pics"

Actually, you're all talking in terms of e-mail delivery. The bandwidth really isn't all that much, and ask any park if they want a high margin add-on product that requires zero physical inventory and TiggerMan will be King!

But if you're worried about mis-entering e-mail addresses, there's a much easier way to do this. Once someone orders the digital photo, why push when you can pull? Store the pics on the park's website. When you order the digital pic you get a claim number. On the park's main page there will be a link to the photo gallery where the buyer can enter the number to retrieve the picture.

This works on many different levels. For starters, it would drive sales because, egoists that we all are, it would mean that we would be featured on the website's photo gallery (albeit randomly). It would also bring people back to the site after they leave the park, which would give the park a chance to promote a future visit. And, since most people use park site's BEFORE they go to the park, they would notice that they can be part of the picture gallery and that would stick with them when it's time to get off the ride.

So, show me the flaw in this tweak? The bandwidth and storage costs? Minimal, and can be written off as promotional (the pictures would expire after a set amount of days, perhaps). The complexity? Hey, you get a claim number, with the website on it. Piece of cake.

The comment made earlier is dead-on here about folks not buying the pictures because they don't want to lug them around. It's even worse because folks run to the big ride of the day first -- the one they would probably want the picture the most -- and pass because they have the long walk back to the locker and they want to take advantage of early park time to hit more rides.

Rick

I think this idea is great.

A couple years ago, we took the helicopter tour at PKI. They offer a picture of your party with the helicopter. When we bought it, we asked them if we could get the file and they simply gave it to us on a floppy disk. They were really great about it.

Jeff you don't have to bash what I said......especially when you got it wrong. I wasn't referring to the email I was mainly talking about actally having it physically sent to your home address.

The only thing with the email is you'd have to have some one putting all the addresses in the computer. And knowing how dumb some parks are (Six Flags) they'd higher the extra person!

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Kara owes me two cookies. hmmmmm cookies.

It's real simple.

It works at Fiesta Texas, Astroworld, SF Over Texas,

Sf St Louis, and Magic. Buy the picture and ask them to hold it until you leave. I have never been told no. Try it.

Ok... once again. This isn't a debate about WHAT do with an on-ride photo once you purchase it. I think EVERYONE here knows what lockers exist. We're all bright folks aren't we? ;)

Second, e-mailing the pics is in ADDITION to what parks currently offer. The idea isn't to REPLACE physical on-ride photos, but rather, ADD the electronic option.

Next... 4 buddies and they all want pics on a ride? Been there done that... one person buys the photo, scans it, and sends it to their friends. I've done this with every photo I've bought.

Paris: I thought of that variation also. Instead of e-mail, the park posts the picture on a website for you to download.

Lord G: I got dibs on the royalties it's my posting :)

Laurence: Nice to hear the UK is doing this. Though I'm a bit surprised it costs MORE to e-mail the photo.

I would think that since they park doesn't have to use any materials it would cost less. At $5 a pop, I know I'd be inclined to spend a heckuvalot more than when the pics are $10 a pop.

Personally, I could care less about having a physical photo to hang on to. I'd much prefer the electronic version. This is just me though.

NOTE TO ANY PARK REPS READING THIS: Please? :)

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Men are like parking spaces... the good ones are all taken and the rest are handicapped or too far away.
www.TiggerMan.com

As a person who has purchased several on-rides over the years, I see this as nothing more than people wanting a product that's not offered & the product that's around is too expensive for them, sure, people would buy every on-ride if it were one dollar, it's a no-brainer. ;)People just forget that many people around here seem to travel to many different parks every season, let's just make the whole annual experience cheaper for them, they really need to save the dollars & time/effort involved with the photos. For one, you have the option NOT to make the purchase, especially if you know you do not wish to carry something around. As for "having" to take on-rides on water rides & such, if you had something with you, you know you had it with you when you got into the line.

They are souvenirs, LOL. They come, many times, in a nice folder with cool junk written & nice coaster graphics decorating them. While my home printer may spit out a nice little snapshot, they cannot offer the same level of product to me through any other service that's out there now. I know my printer cannot make something as decent as the folder my MF on-rides came in, nothing even close. As for the actual photo itself, they're almost secondary. There's the occassion when either my wife or I are absent from the shot, or looking some strange direction, but really it's about being some place.

As for it being an extra option, I'd rather send them to my family than myself. Say they offer you a certain number of prints per purchase that you could theoretically take, up to four or something. As for people giving the wrong address, just place a "Please give correct mail address or you will not receive your purchase" & then offer two spaces that the address must be entered into, if they still give the wrong address, they shouldn't have been messing with it, you know? Besides, I think we'd be shocked to find out how many people out there that do not use eMail, I for one think that most people I meet or know do not even use the web at all, for anything, much less a computer!

BTW, I'd like to see a really, really good system that takes the actual photo. Especially if you've ever tried to get a good on-ride on a ride like Volcano or Alpengeist, it's tough, man, real tough. Some rides are great, but most it's like they've put the camera just wherever.

Actually, What parks should do is give you a little card with a number on it. When you are ready to leave, give them your card, and they will give you your on-ride photo! They could easily store your photo in some kind of bend, until you pick it up like photo centers do!

p_c_r, I don't think anyone mentioned this as a matter of saving money. Folks who buy the on-board photos will buy them either way. This was a suggestion that would be incremental revenue for the park with little in terms of additional overhead.

How much would you like to wager, that in 3 years, at least one of the major parks will have a $14.99 on-board photo option where your on-board shot is pressed onto a photo CD, which will also include a slideshow with the coaster's queue music (if it has it) filled with publicity stills of the ride along with your on-board photo. A multimedia section will feature coaster stats, as well as other park promotional material.

How much would you like to wager, that in 5 years, tat least one of the major parks will have a $19.99 on-board photo option where you on-board shot is pressed onto a DVD, which will also feature POV footage and multimedia goodies like an audio channel interviewing the coaster creators as well as park executives talking about the ride and what it means to the park.

It's not about being cheap, it's about drawing the connecting the dots to form a line of logic. I'm fairly sure that Tigger's suggestion will come to pass by next season. It's probably on the drawing board somewhere as we speak. Go into any photo lab nowadays and they will give you the e-mail option or the option to have your roll pressed on a CD.

Forget the "one size fits all" on-board of the present. Think of the future in which the Holiday World website will let you click Holidog and Safari Sam onto your Legend on-board picture. Then go to Cedar Point's site to turn your daylight shot on Millennium Force into a night one, with just one click, which will be an Easter Egg for a discounted starlight entrance your next time out to the park.

Parks haven't even scratched the surface of what you can do with the loyal and the curious. Forget Kennywood's seemingly botched "Phantom Phanatic" campaign. Paydirt is much cooler than even that.

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TiggerMan said:

Lord G: I got dibs on the royalties it's my posting

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True, but I'm talking about my "do it yourself" kiosk idea.

Like Michael Jenkins said, there's already a similar DIY kiosk area at Epcot that lets you send pics and video digitally to an e-mail addy of your choice. It's simple as anything to use and the only thing that would have to be added is an option for a photo ID number input. Simple as that and your on ride photo is waiting for you at home.

I see it as a replacement to the physical print. As more and more people begin using digital cameras it seems the physical print of an image is becoming less and less important. You can still use one of numerous methods to get a high quality print. (probably better than the crap the parks pass off now as prints - every one I've ever bought or seen first hand has been less than amazing)

There are several on line services (I believe we all plug ofoto.com here) that do prints from digital files, most developers, including the cheapo department stores can do prints from a digital file or if you have a decent printer and paper then printing you own can be very good quality too (at least equal to what you're buying)

It won't be long before we see this option available.

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www.coasterimage.com
Dorney Park visits in 2002: 14

I like the idea. They could also do this for other stores and some of the games.

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Six Flags, the only chain of parks that can manage to have stacking with a one train operation.

Great idea! Unforunately, they really don't make too much money off the on ride photos. For this reason, parks subcontract out the on ride photos, they are mostly small companies, so you could probably call one of them with your idea.

I buy photo paper occasionally if people want hard copies of shots I've taken digitally. At the moment, I pay no more than about $1 or $2 per sheet of paper. Electricity and ink costs are tiny, under $0.20 per photo.

This is when I buy this stuff, maybe once a year. Don't you think that a park that buys hundreds per week, would get bulk discounts. Forgetting the fact that many parks have partnerships with Kodak or Fuji (or Agfa :)), immediately cutting their costs again dramatically.

They charge what, $12 or so for a photo (here they do, anyway), that's $10 profit on the items. They usually sell one or two per trainload. That equates to quite a lot of money, and a huge profit margin.

What I'm getting at? Well, parks here certainly don't contract other businesses for photos. With the huge money to be made, I'm surprised any park does this at all.

Most parks however, do use the same software. Movie World here, uses one called 'Thrill Pix', an Australian built piece of software. Kodak make software that does it, I'd say there are at least 20 or so different programs that cater for ride photographic systems.

I assure you that such software has been developed that does allow the electronic transfer of photos. I'm sure that parks just haven't opted for it, because it could potentially be a bit of a risk.

What I'd like to see, is as others have said, kiosks. Three or four machines against a wall in the shop, that you can simply pop in a few $$, type in your photo number, verify that its the one you want, enter your personal details, push the big green button, and its all done.

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So what if the best coaster in Australia is a second hand Arrow?

quailroberts: Are you insane? Do you really think it's low-margin business at $8 to $12 for each photo? They aren't printed on gold, and they sure as hell don't contract anything out. They may have service contracts, but please, this is not high-tech stuff, and it's not that expensive, especially when you're cranking out a few hundred images per day.

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Jeff - Webmaster/Admin - CoasterBuzz.com, Sillynonsense.com
7/27: Subdivision Cam becomes party cam at the year's hottest Ohio luau!

At Europapark / Germany they have that system at their water-coaster "Poseidon". I can't remember if they have it at any other too.

When buying an onride-photo you have the option to send your photo by email once - no extra charge for that. Unfortunately they don't offer to only send it digitally for a lower price. I bet more people would like to do so than buy a print.