My opinion of how to become a self taught photographer....

The path to becoming a self taught photographer can be long and tenuous and if you are like me, you will never be satisfied that you know enough about photography. Becoming a self taught photographer requires dedication and perseverance to succeed. Fortunately, the camera bug did not bite me until digital cameras were fairly well developed and in common usage. While the basics of photography are the basics of photography, digital cameras do have differences. It is not like film photography, where once the film is exposed to light it is done. You do not have the expense of buying and wasting a lot of film learning (probably incorrectly) by shooting. One of the advantages of digital Photography is that you can look at the picture and if you are not happy with it, you have only wasted the time of the shot and the pixels that composed it. Simply click the “delete photo” button on either your digital camera or the computer program you download your photographs to.

With digital photography your storage media, be it an SD Card, Memory Stick or something else, is your “roll of film”. Unlike traditional film, you can reuse your “digital film” many hundreds of times before it is time to buy the next “roll”. Another difference between film photography and digital photography is that the ISO speed is set by a button or knob on most or all digital cameras, while with film photography you have to select a roll of film with the desired ISO speed and insert it in your camera. Changing rolls of film to meet current shooting conditions can be tough or impossible depending on the situation. With a digital camera you simply change the setting on the camera body and continue shooting. The only time you really have to stop shooting is when you fill your current storage media and then it is normally only a few seconds to switch it out with a new media source. I believe that you get the basic idea and I will gloss over further comparisons between digital photography and film photography. While it is always a matter of personal choice, I prefer digital photography to film photography in nearly every instance.

One of the first rules of becoming self educated as a photographer is to read, read and re-read the manuals and documentation that came with your particular camera. If you don't understand it all at first (and I didn't) as you practice with your camera the epiphany light will light more frequently and burn brighter all of the time. (One part of the Merriam Webster definition of epiphany is: a moment in which you suddenly see or understand something in a new or very clear way.) If for some reason there is no documentation with your camera you can probably get the same information from the website of the camera manufacturer.

The next rule of self education is to practice what you have been learning from your study resources. The old saying “that practice makes perfect” is quite true. Besides, practice is normally fun, even if it takes a long time to become proficient with any individual technique. If you have practiced nearly enough, you will be able to use every button and feature on your camera while you are steadily taking pictures with it without having to stop and search for the feature you want to activate. Then it is time to practice some more.

If you are like me, you will tend to gravitate to one type of photography at first. In my case I already had a love of nature and wild animals, so it was not at all unexpected by me that I would focus on wildlife photography. You can see the results of that specialization at http://chris-mercer.artistwebsites.com/ or http://www.viewbug.com/member/chrismercerimages.

One of the best free resources for learning about photography is your local public library. They probably have or have access to literally hundreds of books and magazines on all aspects of photography. Normally all it takes is a few minutes to fill out the information needed to get a library card. Bear in mind that the books or magazines must be returned in the condition that they were lent to you or you will be responsible to pay for the damages. You might even be able to start a photography club there.

Another excellent resource for learning about photography are the various magazines that cater to the various disciplines of photography. In my case I prefer magazines such as Outdoor Photographer at http://www.outdoorphotographer.com/ and Popular Photography at http://www.popphoto.com/. Probably the absolute best resource is someone with more training and experience using a camera that is willing to mentor and guide you to the right learning resources.