New camera!

So I got my new camera today! Canon Rebel XT Black. A good friend of mine lent me his 18-55mm lense to get me started. This is a picture I took with it to get me more familiarized with how to work the camera. You can look at the other four pictures in my Picasa album under the links section.

So for this picture I started at 55mm. Then I took the picture (f/8.0, 1.3 seconds, 1600 ISO) and zoomed out to 18mm. I tried it about six or seven times before achieving this picture. Its hard because you can't see what you are doing while the lens is open, so its all trial and error. I found that practicing it without taking a picture is good. Then you can develop a steady speed and figure out how much to move the camera, if at all, to get a decent framed shot.