I have always been drawn to art & lately 2 photography which I may possibly want 2 pursue as a career.Advice?

I would not pursue that route. Photography is extremely competitive and only a few can make a real living at it. Truck drivers, dentists, plumbers, and optometrists make far more money than the average photographer. j

You might want to sit on that idea for a little bit because it could very well be a phase your in. Also photography is not what it used to be. People who are famous with photography have already been in the door for many years. With all this photoshop nonsense, anyone could be considered a great photographer. Also if you want a Canon, stay out of the Rebel series, good cameras but pay a little more for Canon d series. worth the money

Hi Natalie Here's my suggestions: 1. A course sounds too inflexible for your personal situation and home commitments right now, so try this online digital photography learning material, which covers as much as most courses and doesn't skip the basics - free too... http://www.image-nut.com 2. Now you have your flexible learning sorted let's deal with your camera. It's perfectly up to most jobs frankly so you really need to learn how to use it well. It's a 12mp DSLR and that's going to make learning easy compared to film. I wouldn't get kit obsessed as a lot of photographers seem to be - the most important investment is in what you know about using a camera, not what you're packing. 3. I'd even consider second hand - it's not ideal but you need a camera to learn on and to use so why not keep your costs down as there will be other things you'll want to buy, such as: a tripod a tripod head perhaps a decent zoom lens or 2 or 3 good prime (fixed focal length) lenses. filters - such as a Polarizer, neutral density filters, UV, graduated neutral density filters a monitor calibrator - so you can rely on your monitor looking right before you edit your images Photoshop - expensive but a good investment reflectors a flashgun spare batteries and media cards So, there's a lot to photography and you'd be wise to give it some thought and plan ahead. As for whether you'd make a pro or not, that's probably a long way down the line right now - the most important thing is to get the first few steps (like your kit list) worked out and then to get a really good solid grounding on the technical side of photography... that information will free you both creatively and technically. If you do this you'll get the ability to think around problem situations and have a much better chance of making better images in the longer run. So if you become a good amateur photographer first, you are much more likely to make a good pro later Good luck.

Read Read Read and then Read some more. Study the pictures of people you like. John Hedgcoe has several good books he is who we read when I took my classes, Bryan Peterson on Understanding Exposure. Ansel Adams has several books, the camera, the negative, etc., Scott Kelby is excellent for learning about photoshop. For inspiring photographers look up: Bill Fortney, Bill Lea, Richard Bernabe, Harold Sweet, Danny Demster, William Manning... all great photographers. The xsi is a consumer grade camera, however it is a great little thing and has all the bells and whistles. It would be a good place to start... That being said you can take professional shots with it, but in the photo world, looks are important, so although that camera could possibly be used. If you are shooting a wedding, someone in the audience is going to have it too and it won't look good that you don't have better equipment. Plus the more expensive is made to handle more of a workload and is more heavy duty. But if you are unsure, I would start with the xsi, they will all be outdated by the time they get out of the box anyway so you could always upgrade when you started to really get serious about charging people. Good Luck. I make money at photographery and poster #1 are you saying photographers aren't nobel or productive? I would say putting in an 18 hour day for a wedding is pretty damX productive.

the rebel is fine, what makes professional images are photographers using lights goto a library and get out a few books, some will suit your learning style some wont, imagenut is a great site, also photonet. learn learn learn and your images will get better Pink