Being Stadium Insiders (and possibly slightly intoxicated), we felt the need to test out this "program" during the last home stand. We didn't only go to one or two of these bubbly, young photographers to have our picture taken, we went to three.
The photographers roaming the concourses are almost annoying in their willingness to take any photo that you ask of them, and many of them approach fans trying to get someone to take advantage of their services. This makes for a potentially uncomfortable situation, as some fans being approached by the photographer mistakenly feel that they are being forced to buy something. Fortunately, that is not the case, and we took full advantage.
After the jump are a couple of the photographs that we took, pulled as proofs (for free) from the "Photo Program" website, and some additional commentary:
A couple of those are almost awkward enough to be featured on the awesome new website, AwkwardFamilyPhotos.com. Anyway, you will notice that there are only two "sets" of photos, and we mentioned that we had accosted three different photographers to take our picture. For whatever reason, gallery 79 never showed up on the website for the May 19 game. We're pretty sure the Yankees didn't catch on to our game, since the entire gallery didn't show up and not just our photos. We have allowed a couple of weeks, multiple emails, and even a phone call - no photos. We feel bad for anyone who had their only photo placed in gallery 79 and never was able to view it.
Overall, the Yankees Photo Program is a welcome addition to the ballpark. With the Yankees stringent bag policy, some people may feel uncomfortable bringing their nice camera to the game. Perhaps this is just another ploy to rip off fans (the prices for the photos range from $14.99 for a 5 x 7 with a cheesy Yankee Stadium border to $349.99 for a "15x17 Frame with 8x10 Print, Laser Engraved Stadium Facade, Official Piece of Game Used Baseball and Playing Surface"), but if you are savvy, it is a free way to get a photo from your visit to Yankee Stadium. Of course, the website is built in a way that prevents users from simply right-clicking and downloading the photo as a .JPEG, but if you know how to create a screen grab, it is simple to extract a relatively low resolution version of the photo that is fine for posting to facebook, or using on the web.
