As of January 1, 2019, we have closed our forums. This is a decision we did not come to lightly, but it is necessary. The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk. The server software itself must be updated, and it cannot be without removing the forums.
So it is with a heavy heart that we say goodbye to our long-running forums. They came online in 2000 and brought together so many wonderful Disney fans. We had friendships form, careers launch, couples marry, children born ... all because of this amazing community.
Thank you to each of you who were a part of this community. You made it possible.
And a very special thank you to our Guides (moderators), past and present, who kept our forums a happy place to be. You are the glue that held everything together, and we are forever grateful to you. Thank you aliceinwdw, Caldercup, MrsM, WillCAD, Fortissimo, GingerJ, HiddenMickey, CRCrazy, Eeyoresmom, disneyknut, disneydani, Cam22, chezp, WDWfan, Luvsun, KMB733, rescuesk, OhToodles!, Colexis Mom, lfredsbo, HiddenMickey, DrDolphin, DopeyGirl, duck addict, Disneybine, PixieMichele, Sandra Bostwick, Eeyore Tattoo, DyanKJ130, Suzy Q'Disney, LilMarcieMouse, AllisonG, Belle*, Chrissi, Brant, DawnDenise, Crystalloubear, Disneymom9092, FanOfMickey, Goofy4Goofy, GoofyMom, Home4us123, iamgrumpy, ilovedisney247, Jennifer2003, Jenny Pooh, KrisLuvsDisney, Ladyt, Laughaholic88, LauraBelle Hime, Lilianna, LizardCop, Loobyoxlip, lukeandbrooksmom, marisag, michnash, MickeyMAC, OffKilter_Lynn, PamelaK, Poor_Eeyore, ripkensnana, RobDVC, SHEANA1226, Shell of the South, snoozin, Statelady01, Tara O'Hara, tigger22, Tink and Co., Tinkerbelz, WDWJAMBA, wdwlovers, Wendyismyname, whoSEZ, WildforWD, and WvuGrrrl. You made the magic.
We want to personally thank Sara Varney, who coordinated our community for many years (among so many other things she did for us), and Cheryl Pendry, our Message Board Manager who helped train our Guides, and Ginger Jabour, who helped us with the PassPorter-specific forums and Live! Guides. Thank you for your time, energy, and enthusiasm. You made it all happen.
There are other changes as well.
Why? Well, the world has changed. And change with it, we must. The lyrics to "We Go On" for IllumiNations say it best:
We go on to the joy and through the tears
We go on to discover new frontiers
Moving on with the current of the years.
We go on
Moving forward now as one
Moving on with a spirit born to run
Ever on with each rising sun.
To a new day, we go on.
It's time to move on and move forward.
PassPorter is a small business, and for many years it supported our family. But the world changed, print books took a backseat to the Internet, and for a long time now it has been unable to make ends meet. We've had to find new ways to support our family, which means new careers and less and less time available to devote to our first baby, PassPorter.
But eventually, we must move on and move forward. It is the right thing to do.
So we are retiring this newsletter, as we simply cannot keep up with it. Many thanks to Mouse Fan Travel who supported it all these years, to All Ears and MousePlanet who helped us with news, to our many article contributors, and -- most importantly -- to Sara Varney who edited our newsletter so wonderfully for years and years.
And we are no longer charging for the Live Guides. If you have a subscription, it's yours to keep for the lifetime of the Live Guides at no additional cost. The Live Guides will stay online, barring server issues and technical problems, for all of 2019.
That said, PassPorter is not going away. Most of the resources will remain online for as long as we can support them, and after that we will find ways to make whatever we can available. PassPorter means a great deal to us, and to many of you, and we will do our best to keep it alive in whatever way we can. Our server costs are high, and they'll need to come out of our pockets, so in the future you can expect some changes so we can bring those costs down.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for your amazing support over the years. Without you, there's no way us little guys could have made something like this happen and given the "big guys" a run for their money. PassPorter was consistently the #3 guidebook after the Unofficial and Official guides, which was really unheard of for such a small company to do. We ROCKED it thanks to you and your support and love!
If you miss us, you can still find some of us online. Sara started a new blog at DisneyParkPrincess.com -- I strongly urge you to visit and get on her mailing list. She IS the Disney park princess and knows Disney backward and forward. And I am blogging as well at JenniferMaker.com, which is a little craft blog I started a couple of years ago to make ends meet. You can see and hear me in my craft show at https://www.youtube.com/c/jennifermaker . Many PassPorter readers and fans are on Facebook, in groups they formed like the PassPorter Trip Reports and PassPorter Crafting Challenge (if you join, just let them know you read about it in the newsletter). And some of our most devoted community members started a forum of their own at Pixie Dust Lane and all are invited over.
So we encourage you to stay in touch with us and your fellow community members wherever works best for you!
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We're about to bite the bullet and buy our first digital camera -- but it's for DD7, not us. I'm too cheap to replace my film camera when it still works and takes perfectly good pictures.
So I'm looking for recommendations for an inexpensive digital camera that is good quality for the price.
She's 7, so the Fisher Price option is out (too babyish). From what I've read the Disney cameras aren't great quality, so those ore out too. That said, she's 7, so dropping and loss are very real possibilities, yet we don't want her to outgrow it right away either. Not that I expect any camera to survive much dropping -- its more an issue of life span and my willingness to shell out much money for it.
It's a purely economic decision. Up to now we've been arming her with disposables, but the picture quality is generally lousy and we only get one or two good pics per roll. Our old 35 mm saves the cost of the disposable camera, but still the developing and printing for 3 good pics is a pretty high per-photo average. So we figure with the ability to delete lousy pics and only print good ones, we'll break even fairly soon.
Last edited by Carousel96; 05-24-2007 at 08:38 PM..
PassPorter's Free-Book to Walt Disney World It’s hard to believe anything is free at Walt Disney World; but there are actually a number of things you can get or do for little to no cost. This e-book documents over 200 free or cheap tips to do before you go and after you arrive. You could save a considerable amount of money following these tips. Perhaps more importantly; you can discover overlooked attractions and little-known details most people whiz by on their way to spend money. Click here to see free sample pages from the e-book! Get this popular e-book free of extra charges when you join the PassPorter's Club for as little as $4.95. A club pass includes access to all our other e-books; e-worksheets; super-size photos; and more! This e-book is also available for separate purchase in the PassPorter Online Store for just $5.95.
I wish digital cameras had been around when my DD was younger as we spent a lot of money developing pictures of walls etc! I don't have any specific advice for you, but I ran across an article about buying digital cameras for kids that you might find helpful. Top Digital Cameras for Children - Best Digital Cameras for Kids Good luck and let you know what you end up getting!
We actually were just facing this dilemma. My dd is 5.5yo and will be 6yo when we travel to WDW in December. I had planned for the last year to pick up the FP camera but the more reviews I read, the more I realized that it wouldn't work out for her (almost every review remarked about the poor quality of the images).
We had been thinking of purchasing a new camera so we ended up getting a Canon SD750. We spent $239 on it (would have spent $60-$70 for the FP camera), plus the extra memory card... and we are giving dd our old Fuji (which I can't stand).
I thought about getting a princess camera but couldn't see spending the extra $$ when she'll do fine w/ the Fuji.
If you currently have a digital camera, and it's an older one, I would suggest buying a newer one for you and handing the older one down. I say this because the current camera you have obviously takes good photos or you would have replaced it already. And the newer cameras give you higher resolution photos, with many more features, for about the same price the one you have cost...
If you're very happy with what you have and don't want to give it up, the 4 and 5 MP cameras are coming down in price to where the are almost disposable. Very few digital cameras are made to absorb much shock from dropping, though those with the rubber coated handles and ends will do better.
Browse this site for camera information and maybe some recommendations
We don't have a digital camera -- I still use low tech film and it works just fine for me. I can't see spending 200+ on a camera for a 7 year old.
We've debated about buying a digital for us and giving her our film one -- but that won't really cure the only-two-pictures-are-really-usable dilemma.
And selecting a camera for us would be the subject for an entirely different thread!
My sister bought her kids Kodak Easy Share cameras for Christmas- they are ages 7 and 9. She got the ones priced around $130 and is very pleased with the picture quality, the ease of use for the kids, and of course, the ability to delete all the "oops" pictures. They recently went to London and Paris and many of the great shots they got came from the kids!
My sister bought her kids Kodak Easy Share cameras for Christmas- they are ages 7 and 9. She got the ones priced around $130 and is very pleased with the picture quality, the ease of use for the kids, and of course, the ability to delete all the "oops" pictures. They recently went to London and Paris and many of the great shots they got came from the kids!
Good luck with your decision.
I have one of these Kodak Easy SHare cameras for myself. (Gave DD the old digital camera.) But even when she takes pics with my camera they are wonderful!
I personaly would reccomend the Easy Share. My mom got a new digital camera (different brand and about $200 more than mine) and her pics never come out as good as mine.
That said, she's 7, so dropping and loss are very real possibilities, yet we don't want her to outgrow it right away either.
I suppose it depends on how much you think she might drop it, or have it get knocked of a table, or sat on, or maybe left out in the rain, etc. It's not like they can't survive a drop or two. Then again though, even one smallish drop at the right angle could total it. Lens could crack, lens assembly could get jammed/thrown out of wack. If you think it's likely to get dropped a couple times, just pick one up that you won't be too disappointed about if it doesn't survive too long.
We've been eyeing up a Kodak Easy Share for DS. He'll be 5 in a few months. We have an older digital camera, but we hated the quality, so no point in handing it down. When we upgrade, DS will get our DImageZ2. He's pretty good with cameras and gets frustrated with the OTUCs because he can't see the picture right after he takes it like when he uses ours. With a small backpack or fanny pack to stow the camera in and a wrist or neck strap to hold it, most cameras can avoid being dropped or lost.
The Christmas before last I got digital cameras for my cousins' three children (then ages 6, 6, and 4 or something like that - I can't keep track, LOL). They have a flash, an LCD screen, and can accept a memory card in addition to the small amount of built-in memory. First thing we did out of the box was to put the wrist straps on them, of course! I still saw one survive a small drop, though.
Anyway, I got them from this site for about $30-40 each (the kids' b-days are all within about a month before Christmas so they were birthday/Christmas gifts - I would've spent just as much buying a toy or whatever for each of them, plus since I got three I think I got a quantity discount) at the time: http://www.ecamerafilms.com I recommend this store!
I got them adult digital cameras because
(a) I didn't want their parents having to pay for film and processing, especially how kids take photos
(b) Children's digital cameras didn't come with flashes or screens or didn't accept memory cards and/or had poor reviews
(c) At that price, it was cheaper than or the same price as kids' cameras
(d) The quality seemed to be better than made-for-kids cameras
Last edited by Ms_Butterfly; 05-31-2007 at 07:02 AM..
DS (age 6) has a Kodak Easy Share and he loves it. It takes great pics. He's dropped it several times and it still works fine. I bought the printer dock for him for his birthday. He loves printing his own pictures.
I love the idea; we just got a new digital and are passing our old Nikon Coolpix down to our DD11 for her use. I definately recommend that you get one with a wrist (or neck) strap, and just get her used to carrying it that way.
I think giving them a camera teaches responsibility, and having one that takes good pictures makes it great -- otherwise they get frustrated that they feel they invested time and energy into taking something that isn't worth much.
PassPorter's Free-Book to Walt Disney World It’s hard to believe anything is free at Walt Disney World; but there are actually a number of things you can get or do for little to no cost. This e-book documents over 200 free or cheap tips to do before you go and after you arrive. You could save a considerable amount of money following these tips. Perhaps more importantly; you can discover overlooked attractions and little-known details most people whiz by on their way to spend money. Click here to see free sample pages from the e-book! Get this popular e-book free of extra charges when you join the PassPorter's Club for as little as $4.95. A club pass includes access to all our other e-books; e-worksheets; super-size photos; and more! This e-book is also available for separate purchase in the PassPorter Online Store for just $5.95.
A great place to look is Craigslist (if it's available to you). I got my daughter a nice Panasonic Lumix TZ1 for $100. It works great (although she is 13 and able to take care of things a bit better than my 6 and 4 year olds). I also have one of those V-tech Digi cams for my 6 yo and I can tell you it's not worth the money if you want good photos. I would look for a used camera (gently used) if money is tight.
Santa got our son a Nikon Coolpix L11 for Christmas and it was a great choice. It has just enough features for an 11 year old, with great image stabilization, big LCD screen, good light handling, and an easy-to-understand menu.
It's a slightly older model (the L14 came out and I think the L15 is due soon or is already out.) The L11 retails around $100, with some places offering it for $85 and other bundle it with a 1Gig memory card for ~$120.
Great camera!
Eileen -- who has two higher-end Canon PowerShots and has been considering "upgrading" to the L11 -- it's *that* good!
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I don't have any specific advice for you, but I ran across an article about buying digital cameras for kids that you might find helpful. 
When we upgrade, DS will get our DImageZ2. He's pretty good with cameras and gets frustrated with the OTUCs because he can't see the picture right after he takes it like when he uses ours. 
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