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Beginner photographer!?

I am a beginner photographer, if you could even call it that. I have a point-and-shoot digital camera (Kodak v530), not anything glamorous with fancy lenses and such. I'd like to get into photography, though. Can someone just explain what are the basics of it, what's considered a good picture, etc. Thanks for all of your help!

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1. I would read about light and composition. Learn about how light affects the photo. Once you know about light, you can practice, practice, practice. Don't worry about having a point and shoot camera. I have a Canon 20d and I don't consider myself anything special. A point and shoot only makes you work a little harder composing the shot you want. Read books (good ones), talk with photographers (the ones that are not pretentious asses), and do your thing! Good luck!
2. Whether your camera is a point and shoot or a studio camera makes little difference when it comes to taking good pictures. Granted, the studio camera can do thing that the point and shoot can't do, but you can do plenty with what you have. You need to learn a few basics that can come through books on photography. Then you should look at pictures that you think are good. What made them good? Look at where the subject is placed in the picture (that is called framing), look at the light, and determine what you want in focus (if you have enough control with your camera). I have never been to a photography school in my life and I bought my first decent camera while in Vietnam. I learned photography while steaming up the Mekong or across the sea. When I returned from Vietnam, I was asked to teach a photojournalism course based on what they saw of what I had done with no lessons. Two of my favorite pictures, one made by me and the other made by my son, were taken with the cheapest thing available for a camera. One was a fixed focus point and shoot, the other was with a Pentax 35-70mm zoom point and shoot. I will tell you, as I have told everyone who has asked similar questions, what will make it good or not so good is the gray matter between your ears. Look about you. Even when you don't have your camera there, there are pictures that you could take, if only in the mind. The quality behind a good photographer is how he sees things, not all that mechanical crap.
3. Welcome to the Art of Photography! Most people do start with a P&S camera. I started out with a Kodak too but I hated it. Then I went to Canon and I have never gone back! If your looking for a cheap camera that is not an SLR I would go with the Canon A630 or higher (Canon came out with the newer versons but I own the A630) It has a few manuel features that you can tweadly with and mess around so this gives a little more advange over P&S. A few basics: Shutter Speed: this controls how fast or slow a shutter opens to allow light onto the sensor. Faster the shutter speed, ex. 1/2000, the less light is allowed in and freezes a subject in an imagine. Slow the shutter speed, 1/4, the more light is allowed in but it also will cause either a camera blur or a subject blur. However this may be a good touch to your imagine if you so desire it. Use a tripod for anything slower than 1/8. ISO: This boosts the sensitivty of the sensor which enables the photographer to take brighter pictures at a higher shutter speed. This is great for sport shots in low light conditions so that you do not have to sacrifice subject and camera blur on your imagine. But this creates noise on the picture and the higher you go the more noise there will be on the picture. Some cameras handle ISO better than others. Exposure: How bright or how dim the camera makes the picture Ampature: This is how big or small the hole is in the lens is. The lower the ampature, the faster the lens is and the smaller the hole is (ex. f/1-2.8) this give a narrower field of vision, this blurs the back round. The larger the amapture the larger the hole is and the deeper the field of vision it is. (3-infinity just how large the lens can get) Now to I guess define photography. Photography is the art of capturing a moment and preserving it in a picture. Photography can be as basic as just getting a camera and taking a picture of a rock. There are really no such thing as a good picture, thats based on opinion. As a photographer myself I take pictures of different objects and try to present a mood, feeling, story. I take pictures that only I may think is beautiful and sometimes I take things that other people like as well. As you become more advance with photography you can take pictures of a plant and give it life by changing different settings on your camera and other things. As you become more advance you can use photoshop but I like sticking with "natural" shots (striaght for the camera, maybe just increase the brightness or contrast but nothign else) Another thing photography does cost you money. How much? As little as $150. You do not need a fancy camera to be in photography. But if you are looking to be a serious photographer you may want to look into an SLR, Single Lens Reflex. Why? SLRs have larger sensor. The larger the sensor the better. The larger sensors take in more light or data. Which allows better picture quality. But if the sensor sucks, thats a different story. Canon & Nikon are very popular because they have been very reliable cameras. MP mean NOTHING. Do NOT buy a camera based on megapixels (MP). No matter how many MP it has doesnt mean its better. For example, a P&S camera vs a SLR. The P&S has 10MP while the SLR has 8MP. This doesnt make the P&S better than the SLR because the SLR has a better sensor than the P&S which results in better picture quality. Lens. Lens are almost as or even equal to the quality of the cameras sensors. If the lens suck then the picture quality is going to suck no matter how superior the sensor is. Invest money in lens. External Flash Units. Invest money in that for indoor and portrait shots. Flash units reach a lot farther than the bulit in flash of any camera. Also they provide more custom shots by bouncing the light off the ceiling or a wall this will give you not as harsh of a glare on your subjects imagine. This is not required however. Get a large memory card if you are a serious photographer. I easily take 400+ pictures when I go out to like Disneyland or to a family party. Professionals take over 1000 for one project. There are many different types of styles, Wildlife, land scape, sports, portrait, studio, marco, etc. Get a camera that will best suit your needs. Wildlife will require at least a telescope lens which is extremely expensive. landscape you will need a wide-angle len which are relatively cheap but still over $200+. Sports you will need a lens that are extremely fast, you need a lens that goes lower than f/3. Usually a prime len only goes below f/3 but those are usually at the height of a companies lens. 50mm prime len will be good for basketball style games. Also a camera that takes pictures at a high FPS (Frames Per Second) and an AI Servo (Canon's Name for it) this changes exposure, ampeture as you move the camera. Portrait you do not need a camera that has a high FPS rate or extremely expensive lens. Usually portrait shots have a "glow" like in some wedding pictures. But you can have sharp portiat shots too but its depending on how you feel on it. Macro is taking a close up on a subject like a bug or a flower. You will need a marco len 100mm or smaller or you can be cheap like me an just use any lens for it =). Most importantly... The picture is usually YOUR fault on an SLR. Do not blame the camera for bad pictures. Read reviews on a camera before you buy. Canon is known for have a bit of a a problem with low light situations but once you learn how to use the camera you dont have that problem any more. Go to dpreview.com and research different cameras. They are exteremly reliable. Like most anything, practice, practice, practice. You will never learn your camera if you never practice. And please... Read your manuel front and back... Itll save you a lot of trouble on the field if you dont like how something is going. Cameras I would recommond- -Any Canon or Nikon camera just not the Nikon D40 because it limits you to what lens you can use. But the D40 still takes excellent pictures. -Olympus E-500 or higher. Little worse at JPEG than Canon -Pentax Try out a camera at your local store and see if you like it yourself. I love my Canon XTi even when people say it has an underexposure problem.