Christmas Lights - A New Place

This year I went to the Lockheed Users Conference (and it was held late in December opposed to the more normal October).  Across from the hotel I was in was the Shady Brook Farm and there very bright and colorful Christmas lights.  I have been to a handful of the drive through light displays and I will admit that none has impressed me as much as this one.  So lets get this started (and as always, click the image to get a bigger version).

Above is a display I have seen many times (so what makes this stand out).  The big reason is that there are 12 of them (12 drummers drumming).  Most places have 3 or 4, but not all 12 (you might not be able to see them at this angle, but they were all there).  There were plenty other more standard displays as well, but in all cases they were at least full displays.

The above one is another somewhat standard one (I have not seen the train too often before, but it is a more Christmasy type of display).  So enough of the standard ones, how about what was different.

Above we have one that is not holiday focused, but more patriotic.  The Statue of Liberty was new for me as well as the tree.  You will see they lit many trees in many different colors throughout the drive.  I think the trees are what stood out the most for me.  It was something I had not seen alot of (and it was used very well here).  But we will get back to the trees in a minute.

Another example of a display I had not seen before (but again not very seasonal either).  Multiple fish and plant displays were grouped together to make a larger display.  It does not show well in the picture, but this really was a larger display.  A bit bigger scale than most places I have seen.

Well, as I said, we would get back to the trees.  Here are a group of them (this time in blue).  They used the trees as filler between different areas (here it is between a more "nature" area and a coming more Christmasy area (where they had more red in the trees).

For a close on the trees, I move just before the blue trees above, to a green set that were well integrated into a grassy scene (complete with butterflies and dragonflies).  Here nature was well integrated with the displays for a really interesting scene.  

Well here we are at the exit.  There was a little more light here from the stop (where you could go inside get hot chocolate etc).  This lit up the road nicely.  

All pictures above were taken with the SX260 and hand held.  As there were not many cars (it was a week night well still a few weeks before Christmas) I was able to get really nice dark backgrounds (on all bt the last picture).  That is important when picturing lights as this makes them really pop out.  Also because there were not alot of cars, I was able to pull over and take all these (and other) pictures (had there been a line of cars, that would have proven to be more difficult.

So if you want nice pictures, go out early, and when they are not busy.  This will make for the best conditions.