I'm fairly new to this photography game and have a simple little compact (Samsung L83t so has lots of features) that, at the moment, only gets used when I go out in town for the usual drunken bar/club pictures.

I'm off on a round-the-world trip later in the year and want to be able to take a decent photo! I've been messing around in my flat with some of the functions (will post some of the results when I get home from work in a couple of hours) and I'm looking to take photography up as a hobby. I have spent the last couple of days mooching around the Digital Photography School blog/forums...

But what I would like from you, fellow forummers, is your handy hints for getting the most out of my camera. Assume I know nothing...

Edit: I have a GorillaPod as my dad works for the UK importer but that is the only other equipment I own

Firstly , welcome to the group :D

secondly view a few of these clips http://www.videojug.com/tag/digital-cameras-users-guide
they are without a doubt the best free video format tips you can get.
I watched them and after following the guidelines i felt confident to move the camera to manual :thumbsup:

Also don't forget to read the manual - loads of people don't, and miss out on all sorts of features. The latest podcast on TWIP (http://twipphoto.com/) had a good thing on this, and there is oodles of useful stuff on the site :)

Thanks for the advice. I spent most of Sunday reading through the manual and playing around with the features on the camera. A quick snapshot of where I am at the minute can be seen in this Photobucket album (http://s32.photobucket.com/albums/d27/sheff_minx/Photos/)

These are my favourites though:

http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d27/sheff_minx/Photos/ST830645.jpg

http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d27/sheff_minx/Photos/ST830107.jpg

http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d27/sheff_minx/Photos/ST830153.jpg

http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d27/sheff_minx/Photos/Macro1.jpg

So that is where I'm at... Where do I go from here?

Image no. three, is that Pitsmoor?