Advice for Beginners

This forum sees frequent requests for advice and basic instruction from beginners to digital photography, often also beginners to photography of any kind. Often these requests include specific questions, the answers to which are too complex to be understood by a beginner. This is my attempt to address the need for a list of websites providing basic instruction. It will not be exhaustive but, hopefully, will provide a thorough grounding in the basics.

To beginners to photography I recommend a trip to the public library for a book on basic (not digital) photography - a simple book that explains exposure and focusing. Then I recommend the following websites:

http://www.shortcourses.com/using/index.htm
http://www.kodak.com/US/en/nav/takingPics.shtml
http://www.camera.canon.my/photography/art/index.htm
http://photo.net/photo/tutorial/light

Beginners to digital photography, who have some background in film photography, would not hurt themselves by checking out those four websites. The following are recommended to digital beginners:

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/digital/dlc/index/jhtml
http://digital.photography.home.att.net
http://www.dpreview.com/learn
http://www.dpreview.com/glossary
http://www.botzilla.com
http://www.cs.duke.edu/~parr/photography/faq.html
http://www.megapixel.net
http://www.cliffshade.com/dpfwiw
http://www.kleptography.com
http://users.skynet.be/Canonians

For an excellent site that focuses on landscape photography:
http://luminous-landscape.com

For instruction on PhotoShop and PhotoShop Elements:
http://www.arraich.com/intro.htm

For instruction in the use of Histograms:
http://www.quiknet.com/~frcn/Histograms.html

For good advice on workflow management and the use of RAW format:
http://www.kleptography.com/notes-workflow.htm

A more advanced site for after you have mastered the basics is:
http://zonezero.com

If you want to take courses, online or other try these:
http://shortcourses.com
http://nyip.com (my Alma Mater)
http://photoworkshop.com

Hopefully these websites will provide for the instruction of newbies and make their experience with photography as fulfilling as mine has been.
Cheers--Happy Snapping
Don McVee
http://www.pbase.com/mcveed/galleries