Nikon D-50

Ina

Ina

Well-known Member
Location
Harris County, NE of Houston, Tx.
I have been watching some of you posting some mighty fine photography. A skill I've envied all my adult life. I was about to take a few photography classes back in 2005, when I had bring my college studies to an end.
My wonderful hubby, Michael, had purchased me a camera I had mooned over for 30 years, just before I had to stop my studies. It is a Nikon D-50 digital camera, with a regular lens and a distance lens. I played with it at family gathering, but nothing else.
All of you have made me want to see what I can do with my camera. I've read the instruction, but it has been awhile.
So I would appreciate any advice on how to get started, and what subjects might be best to start off with. Any common mistakes that I might avoid would be helpful too.
Any advice is welcome.
:rtfm::grin:
 

Ina, I've just been using small pocket cameras myself, and I am not one to understand instruction booklets for anything very easily. I usually set it on the most automatic shooting mode, and let the camera do it's thing. If I get more familiar with the camera, I may try some other modes for snow backgrounds, dim light, etc. But, all in all, I want things easy, and have trouble reading instructions and following through. I have a couple of photo albums here, if you want to check them out, none are professional photos to be sure. :)

Being an animal and nature lover, I just started off using my pets as subject. I'd go out into the yard, or on walks, and photograph any birds I came across. Flowers or skies are nice pictures too, some days there are awesome clouds, sunsets or sunrises to get a pic of. Still making some common mistakes Ina, so can't help you there, lol! :playful: Main one is taking pictures on a windy day, and ruining a good shot with my hair flying in front of the lense. :jumelles:
 
I used Nikon products exclusively for a long time as a wedding / portrait photographer (one of my many career incarnations) and I was never let down by them, even after abusing them in some very nasty ways. The only drawback was the price, but back then I was buying most of my equipment from the second-hand sections of the big photo stores in NYC, so it was all good.

I got out of the field long before digital photography appeared and I now only have a little digital Canon that does what i need it to do. I would guess that Nikon has continued with their reputation for great optics and sturdy construction.
 

Thanks Sea & Phil, good ideas to start with. I like that I don't have cost of film and processing. I can delete really bad pics, and I have a good up to date printer. I do use my pics when I'm doing a portrait. Young Michael use to do my pc and printer work, so I'll have to learn how to do those tasks as well. Right now I can't even figure out how to attach a picture to the forum. I'll get there though. I see many questions in the near future. :sunglass::bighug:
 
My new little pocket camera is a Nikon CoolpixL620. Still figuring out how to use it. I don't like the editing software that comes with it, but that may be because I don't understand it. Seems they want you to upload all your photos to their online site, and I just want my pictures to stay on my computer, unless I choose otherwise.

My old pocket camera, a Pentax Option43WR, was nice because it was water resistant and easy to use. Not much of a zoom though, so my wildlife pics had to stay pretty much at the distance they were in real life. Started to get bad pictures, pink blurs, despite my buying a new SD card and going to default setting, etc.

Thing that bums me out, is when I try to use my old ACDC software from my Pentax to edit pics from the new camera, I lose a lot of them, turn into a freaky looking flower that says file corrupted or not supported. Loaded the new software, but as I say, it's not very simple or user-friendly....definitely not what I'm used to.
 
Sea, That sounds complicated, and my son made it look easy, but for portraits I just needed clarity. Now I just want to play with my camera and have fun. Plus I would like to share pics with you guys.
 
Ina said:
Right now I can't even figure out how to attach a picture to the forum. I'll get there though. I see many questions in the near future.
Click to expand...

Ina, always feel free to ask questions, one of us may have a helpful answer for you. Here's some information about attaching a picture from your computer to your post, or starting your own photo album here.

You can upload a photo from your computer by clicking on the "Insert Image" icon above your post . Click on "From Computer", "Browse" to locate the image, "Open" and "Upload". To use a photo from another website, copy full URL of photo (not webpage) , click on "Insert Image" icon, click on URL, copy and paste.

Another way to add a photo to your post is to click on "Go Advanced" under the post, if you're not there already. Then, below the post, click on "Manage Attachments". Click on "Add Files", browse your computer for the photo, open, and click on "Upload". When it's uploaded, click on "Insert Inline"...and it will go into the post you're working on.

You can also start a photo album, and upload the photo into that. Then you can use the same "Insert Image" icon, click on "URL", then paste the copied BB code from the photo in your album.

If your photos are bigger than 1024x768, they will be re-sized automatically during the upload. After the automatic re-size, the file size will be reduced below 300KB (most will be smaller than 200K). So, you don't have to reduce the file size. But some photos can be very big, you can save some upload time if you reduce them before the upload.
Click to expand...

You can create your own photo album(s), and share your favorite pictures with others on the board. You can do this by going into your User Control Panel, by clicking on "My Profile" at the top of the forum page.

On your Profile Page, you'll see the section named "Albums", then click on "Add Album". Once you've named the album and added a description (optional), you can "Save" it and begin to upload pictures from your computer, by clicking "Upload Pictures".

To start uploading, click on "Add Files", then click "Browse", locate the photo you want on your computer, then click "Open", after that click "Upload Files". You'll see when the photo is uploaded, as it will show in the strip at the bottom of the window.

Once they're uploaded, click "Done" and you can add a caption to each photo by highlighting the image number and replacing it with a name or description of the photo. You can also choose which of the photos you've added to use as your album cover. When finished, click "Save Changes".

All recently added or updated photo albums can be seen by clicking on the "Community (albums)", "Albums" or "What's New" links at the top of the forum home page.

Albums can also be seen in our member's User Profiles. To see a user's profile page, click on their user name and choose 'view profile'. You'll see their first 2 albums, if they have others, you can click on 'more' to see them.

If you click on "Settings" on the homepage, and you go to My Profile, then Profile Privacy, you can choose for your albums to be seen by everyone, registered members only, or just your friends/contacts.

Albums and pictures can be edited at any time, just click to view your album, then choose either "Edit Album", or "Edit Photos". To delete numerous photos from one album, click on the album, click on "Edit Photos", next to each one you want to remove check the box "Delete This Photo", click "Save Changes" when finished. To delete just one photo, click on that photo to enlarge, check box "Delete This Photo", click "Save Changes".

You can add pictures to your existing album also, by clicking on "Upload Photos".
Click to expand...
 
Thanks Sea, I'm going to get Michael to print out these instruction, so I can refer to them over and over. I have trouble processing instructions, but after awhile I do get it. Thanks again. :bighug:
 
Once you know how to operate the thing, it's all just composing a good shot in the viewfinder. A lot of what I was doing for Uncle Sam was . . . uhm . . . "action". So, see it and shoot it. Had to do that with the "16", too, but that was different....
 

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