So many people ask me all the time, which type of camera should I buy? This all depends on the type of photography you want to get into. If you're just doing landscape photography, your smartphone might suffice. If you want something that can be blown up to a larger scale like 20 x 30 I would recommend investing in a DSLR with more megapixels. Which company should I go with. Canon, Sony, Nikon? All of these companies are great and I've always photographed with Canon. I'm not saying to go with Canon, I'm just telling you what I shoot with. Every camera I photograph with is just a tool for creating art and capturing moments. I need a camera that is fast, equipped with fast lenses for capturing moments very quickly. This is why I shoot with L lenses, yes they are expensive but they are very quick. If your main focus is landscapes, starting off with something like a Canon Rebel with 2 kit lenses found here would get the job done. If you want to focus on more portraits, I would suggest purchasing the rebel and equipping it with this lens found here.  That lens will allow for the backgrounds to be very buttery as they say or to have a lot of bokeh (blurred backgrounds) so your subject will stand out in the foreground. The telephoto lens that comes with the kit above will be good for capturing birds or zooming into subjects outdoors when you are set some distance from them. It won't be that great for indoor candids unless you bump the ISO up to something like 3200 or 6400. If you are looking for a fast telephoto lens, check out the Canon 70-200 L 2.8 IS II here. Yes, it's expensive but it's super fast and captures amazing images. I have the first version of this lens and it's my favorite one to use for candids. You can purchase the first version here which I paid $1700 for when I started taking wedding photos back in 2006. I buy all my camera gear from either Best Buy or Bhvideo.com. I have used Adorama before as well. If you want to rent some of this gear before hand to see if you like it, you can also check out borrowlenses.com