Nikon Coolpix. I've never read the instructions, I just use the auto setting and click.

MeMo

Cheapo Cannon. I find it takes great micro shots but does poorly on distant shots.

If I had money I would get a Nikon.

Edna

I had a Canon A95 that took nice pics but using flash indoors was a drag. Features I liked: swivel screen so I could take photos of flowers that nod without having to get underneath them, macro mode so I could get in closer to the details, fairly good optics for clarity of photos.

Just bought a Rebel XTi and am finding that it leans towards underexposure and that I'm disappointed with the lens that comes with the kit. Am saving up for better glass.

Anne

I have a Panasonic Lumix. I'll attach a link so you can see my photo album.

Can you tell me what is not working right?

I use the "flower" setting to take up close shots of my flowers. I use the "heart" setting to take just about everything else.

Lisa

Here is a link that might be useful: Lisa's Photos

Cannon Elf, one of the early ones. Same problems that Edna has. I love it as it is metal cased (I can drop it without killing it) water resistant (handy like when I watered the camera the other day by accident) - and it is very small and spy looking. However, distance shots are poor, and colors not always true. It's old and pixal ability is low. They are much improved now.

GGG

I'm using a Canon 20D these days-- had a couple of Sony consumer-level cameras before that. I love them all!

Ann, which kit lens did you get with your new Rebel? I have the 18-55 and find it's one of my favorite lenses. It did take awhile to get used to the new system, though, so maybe that's what is happening with you.

wigardenerwannabe, maybe if you post some pictures we can help you with some of the things that went wrong. I find that the biggest issue is that people try to take low light shots without some help from a flash. It's just impossible to get a shot without the shakies, which results in a blurry picture. What's happening is that the camera (if using an auto mode) compensates for the low light by slowing down the speed. You need to support the camera on a tripod if you have one. If you don't, use the back of a chair or something. Another thing that happens a lot is that people (including me) tend to try to get closeups of things, but their camera [lens] just won't support getting in as close as they're wanting. There are often third party attachments that can help with this sort of thing.

Okay, I could keep making guesses, but it would help more to see some pitchas. ;-)

Nancy

Here is a link that might be useful: My new gallery-- still need to cull some/add other images

A recent purchase (Christmas) I now use a Canon Rebel XT. Tho I am only begining to learn it. Prior to that, I had a Fuji digital, which took nice point and shoot pictures. But when I first got it, I too was overwhelmed. Get a digital book for dummies..it helps drastically when just learning. Good Luck, one you learn it, you will love it and the ease...it is like anything new...tuff to get use too...soon you will be a pro!

Nancy, I got the 18-55mm kit lens. It's just not that much sharper than what I was getting from my point-and-shoot. And I'm finding that I miss being able to zoom in closer. So I'm aiming for the 24-105mm lens which also has image stabilization to help with those low-light shots. But you are right in taking some practice to get the hang of the Rebel. I used to have an Elan II that I loved, but that was a loooong time ago.

MeMo, I had a CoolPix too - my first digital. Then one day, it just died of some fatal firmware error.

Anne

I had a Sony Cybershot (early 2.1 mp) which my husband now uses. He bought me a Sony Cybershot H5 for Chirstmas. I'm still learning how to use it. Sometimes I miss my old one, I knew exactly what I had to do to get the shot I wanted. With my new one, for now, it is sometimes yes, sometimes no.... :-(

Guess I should find that dummies book...
Marylu

Thanks for sharing your camera info.
Lisa, your photographs are wonderful. i think I just need to read the manual and quit doing the trial and error I'm doing. A lot of my photos end up out of focus. I'll have to try the two settings you use and see if that helps. I am used to a 35mm and with my progressively 'old' eyes, I think part of the problem is I can't see the photo in the screen display - I want to look through an eye piece so I can see better and so often I don't even know if it is in focus or not when I take the shot. Blah! A tripod would also help and I don't have one...yet.

Nancy, your photo gallery is amazing. I love the California landscape photos and the water photos. Need to go back in and look more extensively at the others. Please share more about what you do - do you sell them?? Stunning work.

Keesha I think the digital for dummies would be a smart idea and I'll have to add to my summer reading list.

Marylu, I don't know much about the Sony H5-- it came out after I'd already moved on to my Canon camera. But! There's a really active and helpful Sony forum over at DPReview.com. There are lots of "personalities" over there, but more often than not you'll get some great help. Even if you didn't want to get involved in another forum, it would be well worth reading through posts. Every conceivable question gets asked and answered.

Thanks wigardenerwannabe. I mostly take photos for my own pleasure, but have used them for my work (graphic design) quite a bit, too. I've sold a few images, but it's not something I actively promote. I'd like to do that someday, but have to get to the point where my portfolio is a lot stronger than it is now. The good news is that I am finally almost to the point where I am pretty consistent at being able to grab the shots I want, but I still have so much more to learn.

As far as knowing when things are in focus, it's likely just going to take some practice. I know nothing about Panasonic cameras, but check your manual to see if there is an option to turn on a beep when it's focused. Or some cameras have a blinking "shakey hand" icon which shows up when not in focus. It took me forever to realize that a sort of moire pattern would show up when my Sony was focused. Lisa's settings will likely help you the most. It's cool that it's got a macro/flower setting. One other thing to consider is that camera lenses generally need something contrasty to focus on-- light/dark or hard edges usually work.

For a kind of decent tripod at a next-to-nothing price, check out Walmart. I used one of these for a couple of years before moving on up and it did just what I needed it to do.

Anne, something you'll need to get used to is that Canon images are generally not sharp right out of the camera. They've done this on purpose, because in the long run it will give you a great deal of flexibility. Do you have Photoshop or some other image editing program?

Are you after trying to zoom in for macro shots or are you wanting to zoom into things that are further away? If you are like me you probably want to do both, but I am going to guess that you are wanting to zoom closer to things further away. Heh... you can always do what I was told to do after a friend got tired of my whining-- zoom with your feet. ;-) In all honesty, the best image quality comes from lenses designed for each specific job. Most of us would give a lot to own one lens that does it all (macro, landscape, zoom zoom). There are a few lenses that come close, but they all sacrifice quality. A DSLR owner eventually has to wrap their brains around the idea of switching lens. A lot. I still hate it, but I've finally accepted the notion.... though I still look for and dream about *the* lens.

Disclaimer: Lens selection is an extremely personal thing. There are so many choices and so many individual needs. You can read up on these lenses (highly recommended!), but for every pro recommendation, you'll read a con. Photographers are very opinionated and aren't shy about saying what they think... and what they think is often based on limited experience with a particular lens. I guess I am no exception. No matter what I tell you, you still need to make the decision for yourself and you need to know that you won't make me feel bad if you end up doing what you want to do and not what I think you should do. (lol)

So here I go, telling you what I think you should do.

The Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM is a lens that I actually have on my Maybe Someday list. I've researched it like crazy, because it has a super duper range on it -- great for a walk-around lens. The IS is really attractive for sure. The problem is that it's only F4, which means it's a slower lens-- you can't stop it down any further to let more light in. The IS compensates, which is great.... but you're not going to get the great creamy backgrounds that you'd get with an F2.8 lens. The other thing that concerned me is that I've looked at hundreds and hundreds of images from that lens and have seen only a small handful that I really loved. The color isn't even as good as the kit lens, which strikes me as odd for a Canon brand lens.

A couple of lenses you might think about:
Canon Zoom Wide Angle-Telephoto EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM
The 24-70mm is an "L" quality lens, which is about the best quality you can get in a Canon lens. It's just so hard to put into words the differences between L-quality and the rest. Incredible sharpeness, incredible bokeh (background magic), color, brightness, etc. This lens doesn't have the IS, but it's an F2.8 lens, which will let you shoot some really low light shots. The older version of this lens (28-70mm) is my current walk-around and portrait lens and I wouldn't trade it for any amount of money. The biggest drawback is the weight (loads of glass inside there!), but I found I got used to it fairly fast.

Having waxed on about the 24-70mm, the lens I would really recommend to you is the Canon Zoom Telephoto EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM. Oh man, this has everything, including a great price! Great reach on the long end, plus you can focus this thing at a distance of only 5ft., meaning that you can actually get some decent macro shots. What I am trying to say here is that you won't often miss the 24mm on the wide end.... unless you want wide angle (landscape) shots, but then you'd probably switch to the 18-55mm kit lens. The color is really nice on this lens and it has a decent brightness to it. Even though it's only an F4 lens, you can get good creamy backgrounds by zooming into subjects. On this lens, the IS really does count toward getting those lower-light shots.

The really good news is that if it turns out that you don't like your lens, you can sell it without much loss. There's a real market for these lenses-- a great place to sell them is on FredMiranda.com.

As for that 18-55mm lens being sharp, hang in there, because for such a cheapy lens, it really is a workhorse. Check out the link at the bottom, then read the EXIF info below the photo. This image was taken at a super low speed at ISO1600, no flash. Just imagine how sharp it might have been with decent light.

Nancy

Here is a link that might be useful: Miss Em

The most important thing to realize is that we all show only our good pictures :) I can take 100 and maybe only keep 20. That is the thing I LOVE about digital...no wasting film on fuzzy pictures. Sometimes I instantly know they are out of focus and sometimes I don't know until I get them up on the screen. And SOMETIMES I capture something I had no idea I captured. :)

Re: Focusing, usually you need to push the button down halfway to set the focus. I sometimes get impatient and don't do that and I do get out of focus pictures.

Also, the camera kinda decides where to focus, you should see red boxes that show where the camera is focusing. I find by adjusting my stance, or slightly moving the camera, I can get it to focus on what I want it to. It is definitely a matter of trial and error.

I really like my Panasonic. I had been wanting a digital camera for a long time, but I wavered and wavered over trying to decide which one would be best. My dad walked in a store and walked out with the Panasonic. I used his while we were on vacation in Michigan. I instantly fell in love and immediately bought one for myself.

Here's a bee I had no idea I captured:

{{gwi:683814}}

Lisa

some 5-year old Sony. I've been meaning to get a new one, but other(more important?) things have claimed my $$$. I LOVE taking pictures, but have zero interest in messing around with any settings outside of the basic. I always just leave it on Auto. I take a lot of shots and delete those that don't work. I'm very particular about my photos, and hope to get a higher quality camera so I can have a bit more fun.

I use a Canon Powershot that I just bought a few months ago, it takes good distance shots but isnt so good with close ups. If I had 800 dollars to blow I would get a digital Nikon Rebel, in my opinion the best one out there right now (with all of the attachments including the macro lens as well of course!)

Here is a link that might be useful: Only a Paper Moon

We had a cheepie digital camera $150.00 years ago that we broke. Was told it would cost more to fix it than we paid for it... We then had my sister's Canon Power Shot A20 2.1 mgpxl that we used ALL the time and loved it, loaned to us when she upgraded her camera. After seeing others' higher mgpxl cameras via work sent to our online doll magazine, we ended up getting a Canon Power Shot A630 8.0 mgpxl. Really happy with it. All the pics you currently see in the garden albums on my Picture trail we taken with the 8.0. DH knows how to do more with the camera than I and our almost 13 yo dd knows how to work the video feature. Here is the link:

careytearose

Here is a link that might be useful: look at Landsacping Projects 2007, Garden Style/English Style Decorating , and the Favourite ROSES albums

Amazing capture, Lisa.

I used to lug around a manual Pentax SLR with a backpack full of lens. Now, I travel light! I didn't like my DH's old digital Sony (7 years old and used in any photo that I posted prior to March 2007).

I recently got a Canon PowerShot SD800 IS Digital Elph. It is teeny tiny and smaller than my Treo phone. The only thing flimsy is the little door that you pop open to plug in the USB cable for downloading. Everything else is very sturdy.

I can use a manual setting, automatic, or 'scene' setting (such as foliage). It has a digital macro setting so that you can shoot from 1.2 inches to 2ft away from your subject. It has a wide angle and telephoto zoom from 28-105mm (focal length) in 35mm equivalent terms.

I use high speed memory cards for faster shutter speed and tend to purchase the 1GB and 2GB cards.

I really love it and am quite happy with the quality. The images are around 3MB in size and I export these as .jpg pictures to reduce the size (and quality).

I purchased mine online from Abe's of Maine as they are $50 less than Best Buy, etc. and had free shipping. They are very nice and called me to confirm the order and see if I had any questions before purchasing. After their phone call, they shipped it immediately.

See my blog link from My Page for more examples.
{{gwi:683815}}

I just bought a Canon PowerShot A630, and I love it although still figuring out how to use it. The swivel screen is great for angling in on a good background too. Finally I can take photos of white and near white flowers, those never came out right with the disposables.