If anyone is interested

Here's some guidelines that I use when taking digital photos. I ALWAYS use the manual settings. The auto settings are the camera's "best guess" at what you are shooting. Use the smallest aperature setting ( highest f-stop # ), and chose the exposure time based on what you see in the LCD monitor. Shoot other pics at the next fastest and slowest shutter speeds from what looks optimal (called bracketing). Try not to use the flash. Set the White Balance to whatever your light source is. Use the manual focus, pointing the camera at area of most importance. The camera's autofocus will calculate the distance to whatever is in the middle of the frame. This may be what you want, but I prefer to have control over this important function. Don't use the digital zoom. Instead, use the manual zoom at full, and move the camera or model to the space that you wish to compose. If you have a tripod, use it. If not, secure the camera to something that will not let the camera move when you press the shutter. Move the light source(s) to highlight the places you want, and fill the shadows with light. Try to keep the background simple. Background clutter can distract from your latest masterpiece. You can see all my pics on the rongeorge page, aircraft, pg. 3. These were all lit with a single, 100w incandesant bulb, using a Canon Powershot G2 (4 megapix), using a tripod. Photography is a lot like modeling - useful tips and practice, practice, practice. Please don't think that I am being critical of other's work - I am not. But if anyone is as interested in getting better photos as they are in getting better models, these tips may be of some use to you. I have never seen an airplane photo that I didn't like. I have only seen ones that can become more successful. Experiment and post your results ! I can't wait to see them !