Pictures with Santa

[theantiquetiger]

I want to thank the Mall of Louisiana for screwing up a Christmas tradition. A new company took over the Santa village this year and now you cannot take your own picture of your kids with Santa. The smallest price is $20 for a 5x7, and it is a crappy picture taken by people with zero photography skills. I did sneak my own shot while Santa and the "photographer" were distracted. My shot was not the greatest but still 1000x better than the crap they tried to sell me. I just told them it was a crappy picture and I didn't want it.


The focal point was on Santa's face, so I missed the girls' eyes. I only had a split second to take it.

[Realist]

Not bad for a quick pic. I wonder if they really have any power to enforce the no photography rule...

[theantiquetiger]

Not bad for a quick pic. I wonder if they really have any power to enforce the no photography rule...

It is basically a photo studio, so it would be like shooting at someone else's studio.

[Ernst-Ulrich Schafer]

hmmmmm, Lets see, I spent my time and investments to set up a Santa Session at my mall, why would I allow you to take your own pictures there? The old company more than likely closed down because they weren't making a profit anylonger!!!!!!!

[theantiquetiger]

hmmmmm, Lets see, I spent my time and investments to set up a Santa Session at my mall, why would I allow you to take your own pictures there? The old company more than likely closed down because they weren't making a profit anylonger!!!!!!!

The mall brings Santa to the mall to get people there to spend their holiday money there, not to drop any anywhere from $20 to $200 on REALLY bad pictures. I offered to buy the image on CD so I could fix it myself, they would not do it.

If maybe the quality of the image was better, but it was just BAD!!!! I almost wish I would have bought it just to show HOW bad it was. I konw there is a bunch of professional photographers here that make a living off of this very thing (and similar stuff). But for this company to claim exclusive rights to photo with Santa should be insulting to all you professional and is doing nothing but hurting the mall business. I saw several people try to take pictures with their iphones (etc) and they were shut down. I heard several say, such and such mall/store has Santa as well, we are going there.

I am going to go to Bass Pro Shop, where there is a Santa as well, and re-take my photograph, and spend some money there. I did not spend a dime in the mall after this, we left and went to a museum.

I brought this topic up on another forum. A good solution would be a sitting fee. I would pay a $10-$20 sitting fee to shoot one image myself. I offered to buy an image if I could take one, they said no, so I took it anyway.

[Ernst-Ulrich Schafer]

If you see that the photos are that bad, don't buy the Frick'n photo! But I'll buy the image on a CD!!! Don't matter how bad the photography is!

I'm sorry but I don't sell images on a CD either and I feel I'm a pretty dam good portrait photographer.