Oh, my bad I was mostly ranting about myself in case that’s what was going on, I was just saying that when I was (because I was)…I would’ve been better off just using what was on hand for whatever it was capable of. My apologies for being a jerk, and sorry.

As for what you’re looking at that is a bit primitive to me to be honest but you can still learn on any camera. Try and learn composition with it until you’ve picked up a decent one, you can learn composition on a flipphone. If you’re on a budget, I will say mirrorless is probably more or less the future but DSLR tech still does the job just like film cameras still do work just fine and you can grab a used and decent DSLR for pretty cheap these days (as well as a starter lens to go with it). I’m still using DSLR’s personally.

Not to lecture but…I had to learn on a Nikon D50 DSLR (you can literally pick up a used one for like $50 now) and I hated it at the time, but in hindsight, I had a nasty attitude about my gear and could’ve learned a ton a lot faster if I’d just ditched that. I would bet if I had access to one in decent condition now I could make pretty great imagery with it with my current experience/skill level, and if I hadn’t been constantly pissing and moaning about the gear I could’ve learned a ton of theory and stuff and made much better images with it and learned a lot more with it than I did at the time. Just pick up the gear you have on hand, and treat it like you’re an apprentice learning with apprentice’s tools, you can get the master’s tools later on.

I say this because I recently picked up a used D60 to check and yes, I make great images with it despite its age and it’s tons of fun to use it. As of two days ago I was taking really nice shots I’ll be keeping with it. That with an equally old inexpensive lens attached as well.

This may or may not help, but in winter, when trees are leafless, I usually do most of my forest photography in stark monochrome. It brings out the harshness of the season and kinda works with the relative lack of color they have compared to when they’re leafy.

I’m in VA so trees are like subtropical/super leafy during spring/summer/fall then they get barren in winter like now.

So this may be late to respond but like…I shoot still photography and spent $50 on a used Nikon D60 (2008 era entry level DSLR) as an experiment to see if I could get images as good as my Nikon D5500, cleaned it up, and surprise surprise, it works just fine. Image quality is comparable if you know what you’re doing (I got it at MPB.com, by the way). At 10 megapixels the sensor leaves plenty of room for cropping if you make a slight mistake or whatever. I’ve also picked up a few inexpensive older lenses there- and same thing, no need to spend a fortune on new gear, especially if you’re shooting DSLR. Used gear completely changed the game for me.

I would recommend if you go MPB getting excellent or like new condition on the camera body though regardless of what you do.

Mirrorless I can’t talk about, but I do know it’s way pricier. As a final note I’m ironically using the D60 exclusively for now because it’s simpler and I’m teaching myself all the old film theory and other things I didn’t learn properly about cameras with a simpler camera before I go back to the more advanced and powerful gear I shelled out on years ago. I’ve learned so much doing that so fast it isn’t even funny.