I just got a Nikon D40 for my birthday last week. It came with the 18-55 lense. I am a total and complete noob with cameras and I am seriously looking into getting into photography as a hobby. I would like to get nice shots of the mountains, my daughter, some cars etc. Are there any other things that a noob should get to begin their hobby? I have a few shots already that I will post. Mind you, I don't even know about the settings or what all the functions do. I am reading the manual, lol.

 

Bryan Peterson books are pretty much standard reading material for all new photographers. A lot of well written easy to understand information.

 

Besides just going out and shooting everything... google is your friend. This is a good site as well: http://digital-photography-school.com

 

check out the forums at http://dpreview.com/
more info than you can read

 

I read this book and it was really good for a beginner. A lot of it is based on 35mm film cameras, but the principles, techniques and fundamentals of taking pictures and understanding lighting and the camera settings is all the same.

http://www.amazon.com/National-Geogr...3847296&sr=8-2

BTW, that is a great beginner camera, and you shouldn't need anything else for a while. You can search for my honeymoon thread, I posted hundreds of pictures, all taken with a Canon XSi 18-55mm lens. Just a basic camera, but I think some of the shots were pretty good.

 

www.nikoncafe.com

 

here are a few "no skill" shots. be gentle, lol