[roger-roger]

I bought a first for me today a SLR camera, its a Cannon EOS XSi Rebel. Now I have no experience with taking pictures really besides what I have taken with the compact I had. So any pointers you have would be a great help. I also picked up a guide to the camera from Chapters to help me along.

[ziggy]

Get out,start taking pictures!

For video's,familiarize yourself with windows movie maker.Then you can do vid's and post them on youtube.

[ziggy]

Dont forget to experiment with the sunset/sunrise/portrait,etc modes.
They make for some nice effects.Night pics are also awesome once you get that figured out,buy a tripod for them.

[Ripcat]

Take a photography course or two.

[xerxes]

Or just start taking gobs of pictures using each of the modes.

Also, maybe pick up the Dec. issue of National Geographic which has a short article on taking interesting pictures.

[Hyack]

Just keep snapping away , all the pics in my album were taken with a little Sony DSC. The nice thing about digitals is the delete feature, just keep clicking away and see what works....

[Ripcat]

To get the most out of your camera I believe you need to take a course or 2. It will help to better understand what the functions do, lighting conditions, types of lens, how best to set up your camera for the pictures you will take most often.

And yes, a tripod is a must!

[romanP]

Why are you guys talking about automatic modes? That defeats the entire point of having an SLR camera. The first thing you should do, if you're not taking any spontaneous pictures, is turn off all automatic features and actually get to know how to use the camera, and learn things like how film speed, shutter speed and aperture (get to know these terms well, for they are very important) affect each other. Otherwise, you might as well just go back to instamatic.

If you really want to teach yourself how to take good pictures, turn off the flash and put the shutter speed on Bulb. This will force you to steady your hand, know how long to expose a picture, and understand how to set your aperture for different light settings.

[TattoodGirl]

Very Nice choice in Camera!!! Take romanP's advice and play with the camera. And a Mac has some brilliant programs for editing. Have fun dude....btw the pics you already take are pretty freaking unreal...just think what you can do with an SLR

[ziggy]

xerxes xerxes:

Or just start taking gobs of pictures using each of the modes.

Also, maybe pick up the Dec. issue of National Geographic which has a short article on taking interesting pictures.

Exactly! Take it with you with your cell phone and take lots of pics,some are bound to be good if you take enough of them.

Sometimes a course might be too much info,experiment with the modes and let technology do the dirty work for you,the shutter speeds and all that will come to you when you start taking night pics.

What photo editing software did you get with it?

[TattoodGirl]

Keep a little memo pad with you and note what speed, aperture, lighting time of day...etc. when you take a keeper...it will give you a reference point for later experimentation.

[ziggy]

Once you get going post them in the gallery so we can all enjoy them.

http://www.canadaka.net/modules.php?name=photos&cat=17790

[ziggy]

When you got the video figured out post them here.

http://www.canadaka.net/modules.php?name=Video&vop=view&id=521&videoname=arctic-bush-pilots

[roger-roger]

ziggy ziggy:

What photo editing software did you get with it?

The one downside with camera is that it didnt come with any. Im going to have to do some hunting and find a program I like.

[roger-roger]

ziggy ziggy:

When you got the video figured out post them here.

http://www.canadaka.net/modules.php?name=Video&vop=view&id=521&videoname=arctic-bush-pilots

Its SLR Zig, doesnt have a video capture feature.