Wow, this is a very telling topic. The frustration levels are thru the roof. Why not reply "look in your manual" or "if you do'nt have a manual the company will send you one" or there are many web sites that will explain that in detail, or ,JUST IGNOR the question, and look to next one that does'nt bother you. I'm sure most newbies do'nt want to make anyone mad, they are just trying to to get an easier to understand answer. By the way anyone out there know how to turn on a d300s? I've tried wine , choc, soft music, nothing seems to work.

Have you tried exposing yourself to it?

Any one who takes photos IS a photographer. To say "I am a photographer" does not mean PRO. And there are hundreds of thousands of us perhaps, and more likely, millions of us. Now your argument about saying Pro is somewhat valid but few of us say that. Yet you are lumping us all into one basket of misrepresentation because an occasional person tacks on the work Pro when they aren't a Pro. Look up 'photographer' in a decent dictionary. One of the definitions is 'someone who takes photos' Now if you are too good for us find a forum of professionals. If you aren't here to help others learn this is not the right place for you. If it causes you anger to be here, I'm sure you can find another forum that may not. This forum is for 'photographers' as per the dictionary definition to learn and become more 'proficient' at their hobby. Maybe someday they will be good enough to be Pros and maybe not. Most don't even have the goal of going pro. Most are honest people who inform family and friends that they are not Pro and it's unlikely they will be hired as a Pro by people if they don't produce a book of photos to show their method of photography. And by the way, most wedding photographers do use photo editing. Even Ansel Adams edited his photos. Photo editing is an art. Yet you must be a photographer so that you have a photo to work on with editing. Editing photos is an additional artform used with photography.

How about those of us out there who shoot for ourselves and praise from others is merely frosting on the cake?? I make photos for my satisfaction and my eye is the one who truely matters. This may sound a bit egocentric but especially if you're a freelance photographer you have nobody to answer to except yourself. If someone asks me to do a shoot (I don't do weddings or graduations)I shoot what I see and they make the decision if what I saw through my eyes is desireable to them. Why a license?? I'll shoot the same way if I have one or not. My question is what makes you a pro?? I've sold photos so does that make me a pro--I myself kind of doubt it because it is not my chief source of income, so the word "pro" would then apply to someone who lives off income made off of taking photos. This would mainly include wedding/graduation photographers---this I'm not and have a couple of friends who do this type of photography and work bartending jobs on the side to survive. It's a dog eat dog world out there...........