Shop for a digital camera today and you'll be overwhelmed with the choices available. Whatever your budget, you'll find dozens of cameras available at your fingertips. Some have similar features, some are small, others are clunky, and you can even buy one in your favorite color.

How do you pick the digital camera that's right for you? Here are 5 things we suggest you consider before making your choice.

Whatever camera you're using, you can take good pictures by knowing a few basic guidelines and some pro-level tips. Get them from "Shoot Digital Pics Like the Pros.

To create a shortlist of digital cameras, here are the top 5 things to consider:

1. Your budget

Decide how much you're willing or able to spend on your new camera, and limit your research to cameras within that budget. Why waste your time oohing and aaahing over the latest coolest gadget only to discover that it's beyond your means? Now you can look at the cameras within your budget. The next thing to consider is…

2. Your photography needs

What types of pictures will you be taking - portraits? landscapes? sports pictures? indoor or outdoor? The answer to this question will help you determine which features are important for you. If you'll mainly be taking snapshots of your children, you'll probably want a camera with face recognition feature and easy red-eye reduction. On the other hand, if you're always trying to capture action shots from your son's soccer game, you'll want a camera with high-speed burst shooting.

3. How you print your pictures

You also need to ask yourself how you print your pictures. Do you make 4 x 6-inch prints at home or at the drugstore? Then you won't need a camera with huge amounts of megapixels. On the other hand, if you sometimes make poster-sized prints, then look for a minimum of 10 megapixels. If you don't even print your pictures but share them online and via email, you need even less.

4. Who uses the camera

Will your spouse, children or co-workers be using the camera as well? Then you'll need a camera that's easy enough for them to use. Digital cameras that offer automatic program settings are easy enough even for children to use. Image stabilization also comes in handy when young ones or amateurs use the camera.

5. How serious you are with digital photography

Do you foresee yourself growing beyond a digital photography enthusiast to possibly becoming semi-professional? Then look for a camera with features that will grow with your skills. For example, a digital camera which allows you to make your own aperture, shutter speed, focus and other settings will give you enough room to experiment.

We suggest you use this guide to make a shortlist of digital cameras, and then head to the nearest electronics shop and look at each of the shortlisted cameras in person. Note how each camera feels in your hand, how easy it is for you to reach the buttons and manipulate them, and how solid the camera feels.

A camera can only do so much. The quality of a picture still depends on the person taking it. If you're serious about taking good digital pictures, download you copy of this digital photography report. This free report will give you tips on how to take digital pictures like a professional. Get it now.

Finally… Learn How To Work That Darn Digital Camera Like A Pro with this great little guide by Dan Feildman.

You know how you wish you had an all around lens to shoot those candid shots of your kids, whether it's in low light or just great action shots. Your out at the beach or your taking them out to the park, the last thing you want to do is lug around several different camera lenses.

Tamron's  18-270 VC (vibration compensation) fits the bill nicely. It's lightweight, versatile and takes a steady sharp picture. It has a 15x zoom that allows you to get closer to the action and your always ready to shoot because you don't have to be tied down to your tripod.

Here's a video review of the Tamron lens:

Pet photography can be very profitable if you know what your doing. This is an area of photography that is becoming more and more popular, but if you are a newcomer to photography, you might find it a little challenging at first.

Don't even think about specializing in this area if you don't have plenty of patience. Pets are much more tricky to deal with and require a little ingenuity on your part to get that perfect picture.  For a few tips on how to accomplish this we have linked to a few pet photography videos you might enjoy.

Once you master a few techniques, your own your way to creating some profits with pet photograpy. Pet picutures are used all over the world in all types of media, magazines, advertising, etc. Be sure to take some pictures of the pet in the owners in the hands of the owners or their childrens. Also, after taking the photos, ask the owners to sign a release so you can sell these photos to other sources. Keep these release forms on file in case you need them in the future.

A lot of us amateur photographers dream about being one of the those famous well know photographers known the world over. People start to recognize your work, and you become a celebrity of a sort. Until that happens, we love to read about and admire the work of other professional photographers.

Today we will review some of Bill Jay's work and who he is. Bill started his career in England. His photographs have been widely exhibited and published. The founder of photographic studies program at the university of Arizona, he  continues to write a write a regular column for the LensWork journal.

Bill Jay is the author of 20 books on the history and criticsm of photography. One of those books, Occam's Razor: An Outside-In View of Contemporary Photography . The book delves into Jay's philosophy to adopt an "anti-intellectual" approach to photography. Jay writes, "Photography at it's heart is a very simple act, but exceedingly difficult to do well..It is a visual response to an emotional confrontation with the subject."

The other topics covered in the book cover the effect the photographers personality has on his or her images to the nature of being a critic of photography.

Anyone who loves photography would find the book an interesting read and Bill Jay a fascinating photographer to study.

Today let's get educated about what type of lenses are best for different types of photography. Photographers usually gravitate toward what they find the most interesting to shoot. For you it may be butterflies, others may love landscapes or action shots.

First let's talk about Focal Lengths.

Standard Lens - These are supplied with the SLR when you buy it and are a general all purpose lens.

Medium Telephoto Lens - These are great portrait lenses. The most popular Tamron Lens is the 28-75mm. This lens isolates the subject from the background to give excellent sharp portraits.

Long Telephoto Lens - Generally > 135mm, these lens are mostly used for sports or nature shots where you can't get close to the subject.

Macro Lens - Want to shoot a butterfly close enough to see it's segmented eyes? Macro lens is what you need. Also, great for close ups of flowers.

Wide Angle - (<50mm) This is the lens of choice for shooting landscapes and other outdoor scenes. Allows you to focus on entire scene without excluding important elements in the frame.

There are even more specialized lenses out there, but these are the major ones amature photographers usually purchase. The cost of the lenses and more in depth descriptions can be found in our Tamron Lens store.

Let's face it, most of us will never be that high paid professional photographer. Does that mean you can't make money with that passionate hobby of yours. I mean the hobby you have of taking great pictures everywhere you go, and you think some of them are darn good.

Well, tons of people on the web are constantly looking for great photos for all types of reasons. Mostly, they need them for advertising and website design. So where can you sell your collection of great photos? Here's a list of the most visited stock photo sites where you can buy or sell your photos. Not necessarily in order of popularity.

http://www.shutterstock.com                                                                                                   http://us.fotolia.com                                                                                                                     http://www.fotosearch.com                                                                                                     http://www.bigstockphoto.com                                                                                             http://www.dreamstime.com                                                                                                  http://www.photos.com/en

Get going and explore these sites and see which ones you would like to post your photos on. With a little work, you can start making some extra money from a hobby you love. Hey, that makes it even more fun!

Your friend just bought a killer 105mm Nikkor macro digital camera lens and you would love to get one yourself. Yes, the Nikkor is nice, it's a solid lens and includes VR, (vibration Reduction), but for around $900 or so, maybe you can just use a tripod?!?

For the price you would think the Nikon would be sharp from center to corner across the whole frame even when wide open. But as many have reported this digital camera lens has a little bit of edge softness when using it wide open. But the lens is wickedly sharp in the center focus and is free of problematic chromatic aberration at all apertures and across the entire width. Ok, you can read more information about this lens on plenty of reviews, but if you just don't have the $900 bucks or so to spend on it, what else compares to it for less money?

Tamron 90mm Macro Lens

What do you get or not get for this lens for around $469 in comparison with the Nikkor 105mm?

First let's cover what you get. Optically, this lens may match the Nikkor in every respect and may exceed it on sharpness in the corners wide open. It's a lighter weight lens, but still it's built solidly.

What are you giving up? If you can do without the VR and use a tripod when necessary and be happy with a little slower focusing speed, you aren't giving up macro photo quality at all. Plus, you are giving up a lot less of your hard earned cash (saving around $400) for a great macro lens.

Since we launched our LensLuv.com website, we have constantly been looking for ways to add value to our customers and to photographers in general.

We came up with an idea and we wanted to throw it out there to all of you photographers. Would like a way to showcase your great photos to the world. Of course you probably do that already in places like flickr.com, etc. , but here's what we would like to do.

If you want to have your photo's on our site, when you submit your photos, we will create a slide show with them and post them on our webpage, with credit given to you of course.  Slide shows are an easy and fast way for someone to go through your photos and see if they like them.

The only thing we would ask in return is when your are on your photo forums, just send people over to look at your photo slide show.

How does this sound? Got any idea on how to make this work even better? We'd love to hear from you. Just leave a comment!

The question comes up over and over. You want a new lens to do a certain type of photography, but there's a whole plthoria of question swirling around in your head. Which brand has the best and clearest glass, sharpest focus and a bunch of other questions you need answered to make sure you are making a good purchase. And then there's the all important factor of price.

I know where you're coming from. It's very hard to determine your best choice. What I recommend is get on the numerous forums out there that cover the topics of selecting your best glass. Below are a few places you can join up and join in on the discussions:

flickr.com - has many groups dedicated to photography after all is a photo sharing site.

pentaxforums.com

photo.net

martinbaileyphotography.com/forum

You get the idea there are absolutely tons of these, just google photography forums and find them.

Here's a link that has video of different Tamron Lenses in use. I had to mention that, since this blog is all about Tamron Lenses.