I'm Learning!

I've been so frustrated with not having my DSLR camera yet. I really want to try out all these things I've been reading about. Today as I was doing some application work, I spied my Canon Powershot sitting just a couple feet away. Why not? I know that it has some manual settings, and a conversation CedarBough and I had yesterday popped into my head. She was talking about how her husband wants to learn about photography and has a slightly-better-than-average point and shoot camera, but doesn't use it on manual. Well, I have not done much with my camera, either! So I put it into manual and started fooling around. Lo and behold, I can do some cool stuff with it! I didn't even know I could adjust the flash strength, use manual focus, adjust the ISO, adjust the colouring for the type of lighting, and more. Of course, there are still a lot of limitations. I could not use a low f-stop in the dark room I was in, so the shutter speed was so long. I had to hold my breath and hope for minimal shaking. I guess this where a tripod comes in useful. Anyway, I took some practice pics of things on my desk using various settings. I suppose I'll have to learn what I can on my point and shoot until I can get my D5000. (The pictures below are by no means good pictures. Just the results of fooling around with different settings)