Looking for some advice

[Thirsk]

This past November I purchased my very first digital camera. It's the baby olympus, so it didn't clear out my bank account heh, didn't even disapear a paycheque.
How I see it is, when I started playing guitar I got the cheapest gear I could find, and once I could make that sound good, I upgraded... and I guess I plan to do the same with photography. Not sure if that is a good plan, but at least I won't be out all kinds of money if I don't stick with it.

Well, I took a few pictures on vacation:
http://members.roleplayworlds.com/amagain/
most of the pictures that made the cut are there.

There are also a few others that i've taken in the past little while



I was just wondering if I might have any beginner cliche problems.
I was also wondering if there are any sites that you would suggest that could help me get past the startup stages. Or if it would be wise to just go out, experiment, and come up with my own style perhaps..

Any and all critique is welcome on my pictures.
Thanks

[Gary]

You have one consistant problem in the photos I looked at and it's a very common one. A lot of your snow is grey where it should be white. The snow tends to fool light meters because they try to make it an 18% grey. You need to open the lens a stop or two sometimes. You can make it white again easily enough post processing too. Use a levels adjustment layer and then click on the brightest part of the snow with the white eyedropper.

[Thirsk]

more like that perhaps?

Not sure how much I can play around with my lens(being a cheapo camera and all) but I can fix it up post processing no problem

I must say as soon as I clicked the brighter spot of the snow, my picture looked about 20 times better. Thanks

[Gary]

If you can hold exposure like you can on some camera then meter off a grey card. Photo cards are not necessary go to the paint store and get a paint chip. Lacking this meter off the palm of your hand. I don't know what your camera is capable of but post processing for something simple like this is an easy fix. Glad I could help some.