I like many of the pictures and have more than a few favorites. Any yours were just as nice!

Natural lighting is what I found ruined many of my pictures too. Sparkly glares never show the depth that I've tried to capture and instead fade everything out, so unless it's the light you want to capture and not the background.. less glare is better.

My brother reminds me all the time to pay attention to cutting out edges to trees, and the one third rule. Try to have the image in the top, bottom, right or left third of the picture area.

A family friend once told me when he started photography that he asked a professional what his "magic" was. The reply was "The difference between taking good pictures and bad pictures is how many rolls of film you snap".

I forget the thirds thing occasionally, as it is, I only had a friend tell me about it recently. I'm so used to centering everything.

I need a camera that allows the light to look better, I think. Although I've heard a good photographer can take great pictures with pretty much any camera, I'm asking for a bigger better crutch, I think ^_^

I guess they get a feel for the way the light will affect the picture. Practicing is fun and less expensive with a digital camera than the 35mms.

Polarizers and filters. Do they make them for digital cameras?

Yeah, they make filters and such for digitals, just not ours. Ours is extremely low end and really old as well. Most peoples palm pilots and phones take the same quality pics as our old handheld. But yes, I still love that all the pictures are free, way easier to practice ^_^

I think I'm going to have to go to the local "reconditioned" store and pick one up for cheap just to have and use for now. There are so many things I could share on my LJ if I had one.

I've seen web pages where they tell you how to adjust a disposable digital camera for about 20 dollars into a reusable digital camera....

Um, actually, as co-coordinator of the 100steps community, I give you permission to post it there. So please do.

... although, as I'm thinking about it, it might be good to just put a small post about how you were doing a dual-shot 100-steps trip, and put a link to your already hastily-thrown-together 100-steps page. That'd be good, too.

But still post it. We aren't horrible evil creatures who are locked to rules. That rule's mostly there so people don't do purple scenery or add aliens or somesuch... keep it real is the goal.

Besides, nobody's posted there since March, and I haven't had time to do a 100-steps trip.

But you did a 100 steps in the past, I remember it. And I already posted the whole thing, should I edit it to just the link again? I had noticed that it had been a while though. Odds are with both Martin and I posting in our journals that at least one more person will post there soon....

Nah - I noticed, right after I made that other comment, that you'd just posted it. :) So that's cool, works great for me (and besides, it makes it easier than following a link).

And yes, I did a 100-steps in the past, and really need to do more of 'em. You don't just have to do your neighborhood; the other mod, darkladywolf, has done seven or eight of 'em in all sorts of places. I keep wanting to do one that's a geocaching 100-steps.

I'd love more people to post there. I'd keep doing more posts myself to keep the community more active, but I honestly just haven't had the time to pull it off as of late.

I understand the lack of time thing, you have so much to do and even we've been busy little beavers. Glad the current one is okay, I REALLY didn't wanna edit it; what with editing the pics (oops), getting Martins, making the page and adding the comments, the whole finishing stuff took more time for us than taking the darn pictures!

I've got two friends in my list who've made actual money off of photography, so I'm hoping at least one will participate...

I've never made money off of photography. Writing's the only thing (other than occasional craft projects and, well, working) that's made me cash.

Gary, however, has freelanced a couple of pictures to a couple publications. Not many, but a few, anyhow.

And I just commented over on the community; I figured it was easier than cut 'n pasting it in both of your journals, although I can do that too if you guys'd prefer that.

That makes sense, we're both probably going to pop back and forth between each others journals anyways, just so we don't lose anything. You ought to push Gary to do it, I'd enjoy that.

Done ^_^

Hmmm. Lots o' wheels in those pictures. I dig it! :D

You mean like cars?

I checked out the community (joined actually) and I have to say that I think out of the posts I browsed I found you two's (your two's?) post the most interesting.

I'm really surprised the activity there is so low since most of the other photography communities here on LJ are relatively high traffic.

I don't think I'll be able to do any posts there as my new neighborhood is a military base and I don't think taking photos of random houses/buildings would be a good idea there =p Maybe I could go to the nearby city and do that instead.

BTW I heard there was an earthquake near LA yesterday and I thought of you guys...did you feel anything at all?

Glad you like our pictures and cool that you joined! And yeah, apparently you can start from pretty much anywhere, so your town would work as well. I'd love it if you posted, you take some damned nice pictures. And you're in other photography communities? Are there any good ones for tips for beginners?

And Martin felt it, but I didn't, I was driving at the time.

Well thank you about my photos =) They're alright. I probably will post there, I'm really interested in it.

I'm a bunch of other Photography groups, most of them are theme challenges and I don't participate unless the topic is very interesting to me. Read: lately they've been very boring.

Other than the theme communities, you'll find general photography related communities, which I never post in anymore because of the "holier than thou" attitude most of the people in them have. No matter how good you think your photos are you will never get good comments about them...such as the guy the other week who said my pictures looked like snapshots and nothing more.

This is very strange I just had deja vu. hehe...anyway I'm tired, I just woke up for a minute to use to restroom and couldn't resist the urge to compute for a minute or two...so I'm going to go now =p

And about photography tips - betterphoto.com has some really good tips and inspiration if you want to check that out =) At first it looks like you need to dish out money to them but you'll find plenty of free resources there as well.

Thanks for the URL, I'll bookmark that for later ^_^

Nice work from both of you here. I think some of Martin's stand out a little bit more because he goes for the closer in shots.. you get a feel of textures and contrast that way, which is all very pretty and tends to make common things look a little more interesting.

By contrast I think you really did capture the look of the neighborhood like you wanted to. The car with the fire reflection was a particularly nice accident. Some of the shots didn't capture what you wanted simply because they didn't seem quite close enough.

So for yours, I would just say, don't be afraid to play with the zoom. Try to pay attention to the lighting (which you already know) and really pay attention to what you're getting in the shot. I know for a while when I was snapping photos I was just ignoring that little border and cross mark that most camera's viewfinders give you. If they don't have them, you just have to sort of imagine them. Really, over all, its just practice.

Having a boyfriend in a band has given me a lot of practice with picture taking. Another of his friends was doing it before I did, and she used to take discs and discs worth of pictures. She'd get some very choice shots, but she'd also get tons of junk. I find taking 3 for every one you want is a fairly good thing, but of course that only applies if you've got the camera space to do it. If not, you just have to try your best to "feel" the moment.

Those are mostly observations from my own picture taking rather than necessarily specific to you.. I hope they help. And I definitely want to take on this project now, and I think my b/f would dig it too. But it may have to wait until after the 90+ that feels like 100+ weather has passed us. :P

Thanks for the hints, I'll do my best to remember and learn from them ^_^