[Nate the great1]

I thought it might be useful to everyone if I shared some tips on photography. I don't know much but I do know a useful tip or 2. If anyone wants to add a tip please feel free.Still ImagesI have my camera set to take a 2MP image size. It took me a while, but I eventually figured out that a 10MP image is actually less useful than a 2MP one. The quality of the image is dependent on the lighting and how well you frame the shot, not the image size.Drop ClothI went to a fabric store and got 4 yards of a basic black cloth. The price was under $5, and it's more than adequate.Tripod - $40Trust me, you want to get one. I got mine by reading the reviews of the cheapest tripods on Amazon.com, and then following the advice of someone who wrote "if you have a few more bucks, get brand X instead". Mine is very adequate.Digital CameraYou want one that has an optical zoom, flash, and lots of settings. A digital zoom won't cut it, trust me. And if you get the flash then you can use this one camera for both video and still image. Before you buy a camera check the macro setting. This will tell you how far away from the camera you need to put the device in order for the camera to focus on it. My camera works from 1cm to 1m.My camera is the Sanyo Xacti CG-10. I like it because of the LCD screen on the swivel arm makes it easy to hold the camera at the best angle to get the best shot. It also has more settings than I know what to do with.

 

[mogrith]

On your 1st tip I would add Depending on how you will view the finished photo. For posting to a website, Viewing on slate (There we are vaguely on topic now), or making 4x6 prints.For larger prints or blowing up a small part of the picture. Having more pixels is good. There are lots of things you can do to make a copy of the image smaller but you can't show what you didn't take.But I got my first SLR in 1980. But only went digital 5 years ago. Drop cloth and tripod Yes,yes yes What camera to get depends so much on what you want to do and how much you want to spend.

 

[Nate the great1]

[quote name='mogrith;34880]On your 1st tip I would add Depending on how you will view the finished photo. For posting to a website' date=' Viewing on slate (There we are vaguely on topic now), or making 4x6 prints.For larger prints or blowing up a small part of the picture. Having more pixels is good. There are lots of things you can do to make a copy of the image smaller but you can't show what you didn't take.But I got my first SLR in 1980. But only went digital 5 years ago. Drop cloth and tripod Yes,yes yes What camera to get depends so much on what you want to do and how much you want to spend.[/QUOTE'] Hardly anyone prints pictures anymore, so it's safe to assume that they will only be seen online.My camera suggestion (and the image size) is based on the assumption that most people will want to get a camera as cheaply as possible. It's nearly impossible to get a good 10MP image from a $100 camera. But it's relatively easy to get a good 2MP image from that same camera.

 

[bodex]

Yes, inflated mega-pixels is mostly a marketing scheme to the average consumer... it's always the first thing people ask when someone is showing off their new point-and-shoot. As Nate said, most buyers nowadays are only going to be using their images for online use, which require very little in the way of mega-pixels to push out a nice image.If you are going to print out sizable copies... then yes, more mega-pixels will help make for a crisper image. If you find that you need to do a lot of cropping to your images, then again more mega-pixels will help. If you are posting images on facebook, forums, flickr, etc... you need very little.

 

[Mike]

If at all possible you should be using a natural light source, or something that emulates this.