Once you got in the door of the wonderful digital photography world and learned the basics, you probably are hungry for more. If you prefer the old style learning, you could of course register an photography class locally or online. For self-learners, there are more choices: you can learn from photography books
Like most people, the first place I would start to look for information is typically Google. Typically I can find the information I need within a couple of pages of the search results. However sometimes it is frustrating to go through the millions of search results when they are filled with useless press releases, shopping pages, or irrelevant contents. Are there alternative ways of finding information? The Answer is yes.
- Wikipedia – Wikipedia is a free online encyclopedia edited by the Internet community. The contents are nicely organized in each entry, illustrated with charts, photos, and cross-referenced with other entries in Wikipedia and other online resources. For example, if you want to know what to know what causes the Red Eye effect in flash photography, and how to prevent and removal it, this Wikipedia entry is all your need to read.
- Digg – All Digg’s site contents are determined by its users by discovering, selecting, sharing, and discussing the news, and videos that appeal to them. If there is any excellent photography resource, it will likely end up there. The only drawback I see is that Digg users tends to digg up those lists such as “Best of ???” or “The 50 most useful ???”. It is probably good as a random discovery tool but not very good when you are looking for a specific piece information. Here is the Digg search results for photography.
- Online forums or community – There are plenty out there. You can search their post archives or you can post a question and hopefully someone will respond. However people tends to be impatient and you may get some RTFM replies if your questions can be answered quickly by reading user manuals. DPReview forums are probably the most popular one but I found it difficult to have a civilized discussion sometimes. The nicer and more friendly places are Nikonians.org, Nikoncafe.com, Photo.net, etc. Flickr is another wonderful place with integrated photo sharing and social network.
