While the artistry of photography is a life long challenge the technical aspect of is, or should be, very simple to learn.
Unfortunately with the advent of digital photography this is not the case as the cameras today add a layer of obfuscation to the game.
Stepping back to the days of film, before you went out to shoot you had to have already decided on the film you wanted to use, and therefore the direction of the shoot was to take. When you got in the fielding, once you composed and focused, you had the few choices of setting aperture and shutter. With my first camera, if my math is correct, I had 920 possible combination and most were obviously wrong.
Now in the age of digital you can set out with nothing preplanned. Like film you do have to compose but unlike film focusing is optional. Then you have a choice to let the camera handle everything, which is not teaching much, or custom everything. With my present camera, which is not the most advance, the number of combinations and permutations of choices is well over 3 trillion and most are not obviously wrong. I think it is very difficult to impossible for a person starting in this art form to get their head around all the choices.
Even in these digital day if a person is new to photograph and wants to learn the craft quickly they would best be served by simplifying.
SidewaysGlance 