 BetterPhoto Member |
Amateur with lots of questions Hi all. I have been lurking in the shadows for about 6 months now. I ama very amateur photographer. Mainly I take photos of my family and the events we do to scrapbook. I have two cameras, a Minolta Maxxum 400si with a close up lens and a digital Camedia c-3040Zoom. I understand these are both good cameras, and I tend to use digital the most so I can see if I have a good shot immediately. My question(s) or frustration... All this information is so overwhelming to me and seems so technical. I have tried reading books, and have had a great deal of success with general tips, ie. place your person at a 90 degree angle from a well lit window... However, when I try to read my camera manual and mess around with the settings myself, my results are disaterous. Do you guys have any general advice as to where I should start? Which in your opinion would be the easier camera for me to start with? Any thoughts and advice would be greatly appreciated.
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Nirmal Hasan |
Hi Barbara, Since I don't know what exactly you mean by disastrous results, I don't know if there is anything specific I can help you with. I am somewhat familiar with a 400si (I own a 500si) and not familiar with the Camedia, but I would suspect both are equally capable of the type of photography you mention. Both most likely have an automatic mode that would let you use them as a point-and-shoot camera without having to fiddle around with settings. How technical you would need to get depends on what you want out of your photography. I believe (my opinion only) that it is possible to take good, even great, pictures without a lot of technical knowledge. However, it is also my opinion that having a good understanding of a few key and relatively simple technical details will significantly improve one's ability to consistently and reliably take good or great pictures. I am not sure whether you meant that you were trying to learn from the Q&A threads here on this site when you said you "have been lurking in the shadows for about 6 months". If so, I can understand how you feel overwhelmed by the technical details. If you haven't already done so, you may want to read through some of the articles available on this site. You may also want to consider enrolling in one or more classes offered at this site. Another thing that might help is to post one of your pictures here and ask for some specific feedback from this forum - there are a lot of very knowledgeable folks here... Hope that was of some help. Keep the faith and keep shooting :)
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pcmlphotography.com - Pamela C.M Lammersen Contact Pamela C.M Lammersen Pamela C.M Lammersen's Gallery |
Hi Barbara I think that Nirmal has a good idea with the taking a class. I am assuming you purchased your cameras from a camera shop? if so, they normal will run classes for 'beginner' intermediate' or 'advanced' users. Even if you are not able to take the classes dont feel bad taking the camera(s) back and asking them to show you some pointers. After all - that is what they are there for. It can be really confusing with all the bits 'n' pieces that are on individual cameras (both film and digital) but they still all do roughly the same thing just have the bells and whistles in different spots. In the words of Nirmal! 'keep the faith and keep shooting.... Good luck -Pamela :-)
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