You're going to make an initial investment in your camera and accessories, such as memory cards, extra batteries and/or battery charger, lenses, and camera bag. For educational purposes, there are a variety of resources available that will provide excellent information at no cost. Check out the many free websites to get tips and answers to questions you may have. Many of these websites is where fellow photography enthusiasts go to share information and photographs and get answers to questions just like you.

Become intimately familiar with your camera. Don't just take the camera out of the box and leave the manual in there. Read the manual. There are lots of symbols on your camera. They all cause a change in your camera. You need to know what they do, how they effect the final image. One fun and effective way to do this is to take your manual, along with your camera, in your camera bag and find a few subjects that interest you. Then, take shots of those subjects using the different settings on your camera.

After you've experimented with all those settings, you're going to want to see the differences in the photographs and also know which setting created which image. The means to do that is using something called EXIF data, Exchangeable Image File. Which is simply the information about the photograph you took that's stored by your camera at the time you take the picture. This will "put a face", if you will, on those hieroglyphic symbols. It will make it much easier to understand their function than just reading about them in the manual.

Something that will make the biggest impact in the quality of your photographs is learning the basics of composition. The best people to learn from, as in any profession, are the experienced. There are volumes of information online. If you break it down into specific categories, finding good information is a click away. Another excellent resource is the public library. There you can find publications on just about everything you'd want to learn about cameras and photography, some written by world famous photographers.

If at all possible, your camera should be your best friend. It should go everywhere you go. You never know when that once-in-a-lifetime photograph is going to present itself. How are you going to feel if there it is, that beautiful shot with perfect lighting, and you're camera-less? It's just as easy to grab that camera bag when you're walking out the door as it is to grab a handbag or briefcase, or car keys. Don't leave home without that camera bag.