<p>So after about two months in college without any serious extracurricular I have finally decided what I want to do. I think I want to start teaching myself photography. Is there any enthusiast of digital photography? Can anyone recommend any resource for learning the basics of photography?</p>
<p>Try heading down to your school newspaper and join up at the photo department.</p>
<p>Well, first decide if you want to do real photography (with chemicals and film and paper) or digital photography. If you want to do digital, you can just play around on your own, but if you want to do the real deal, you'll need someone to teach you, and a darkroom to use. You could probably find a photography textbook at your school's library, and search to see if there's a photography club. Also check in the art department.</p>
<p>I just switched from being a photojournalilsm major, and am still highly-involved with my school's photoj program. </p>
<p>I wouldn't recomend going to the school newspaper. I'm at the same level as all the photographers on my school's paper, and have done better in all of the photo classes than they have, but I still can't manage to get an interview.</p>
<p>If you're wanting to go digital, do some research and buy a camera. Then just start reading. Look at photography textbooks, read websites and forums (dpreview is good!). Try and get the basics of lighting and composition first, and go from there.</p>
<p>Equine,
Well, I am going to do digital photography, because it's easier and cheaper. Once you have a photocamera and a computer, you don't really need anything else. But I want not just to play with camera to get various pictures, but I want to learn about composition, lighting, similar things that photographers are concerned with. Don't get me wrong: I am not going to do it for living, but I just want my pictures to be as good as an amateur can possibly take them.</p>
<p>HelloKiki,
Thanks so much. As a (semi)professional, can you recommend any digital camera, that would be suitable for teaching myself photography. I have been considering buying Canon S2 or S3. How are they?</p>
<p>Those are both good cameras. I've messed around with them in stores before and was really impressed. I started off with a Canon A95, and still used it for non-class stuff. Even though it's a couple year and a couple revisions old, I can still get amazing photos from it. I'm probably going to use it at the homecoming bonfire and pep rally tonight. I've taken it just about everywhere and it still looks and shoots new.</p>
<p>If you want to go with a DSLR, go with a Nikon. It's a little hard to get used to after a Canon, but it's worth it for the build quality!</p>
<p>I generally use dpreview and dcresource for my reviews. They're both really in-depth (esp. dpreview!), and have really good galleries from the actual cameras.</p>
<p>I'm into photography myself and I have a film slr camera if your going to go digital I rcommend nikon and canon. With canon they have the canon rebel XT as a good starter camera and nikon has the D50 as a good starting option both can be found slightly used or refurbished for under $500 dollars what you really spend your money on in photography is lenses because bodies depriacate quickly and a new one comes out every 18months. I recommend the sites by the above poster for reviews. If you want to visit some forum here are about 3 I visit and post pics!</p>
<p>You also need to find out what particular interest in photography you have such as landscape, architecture, street photography, nude, portrait, wildlife, and macro. Me I'm presonally a landscpae photograpy have always liked nature.</p>
<p>Here are 3 sites:
<a href="http://www.thephotoforum.com%5B/url%5D">www.thephotoforum.com</a>
<a href="http://www.photozo.com/forum%5B/url%5D">www.photozo.com/forum</a>
<a href="http://www.photography-on-the-net.com/forum%5B/url%5D">www.photography-on-the-net.com/forum</a></p>
<p>The last one is a canon digital forum because I shoot with a canon camera.</p>
<p>Oh, by the way, do you recommend buying a refurbished Canon S2 from an online dealer (like BroadwayPhoto) or a new one from ebay? Are refurbished cameras more likely to have technical problems than new ones?</p>