One thing to keep in mind is, when lookng at point and shoots you will end up paying close to $300-$400 for a good one, maybe a little more. You might see some D-SLR's that are close to that price range but you have to think about lenses. WHere a point and shoot can cover a wide variety of shooting conditions, a D-SLR is really lens dependent. So you sink over $500-$800 on a D-SLR you also have to factor in lenses to go with it. Danny, Jaime, Joey, Walker, and Myself sink money into lenses to go with our camera bodies. Walker and I are just starting out with ours and building our lenses up but it will be nothing for us to have to drop $400 min on a lens to acheive the shots we want. Danny, Jaime, and Joey already have some very nice glass that is over $1,000 in just one lens.

Basically like estis said, start off with a point and shoot to see if you really like it and want to go further with it. Depending on what you are wanting to shoot you may be able to get by with just a 3 mp digi cam with basic funtions, a 5mp with a few manual funtions, or you might want to step up to a 8mp with more manual control (Nemesis). You really need to decide what kind of budget you have and what you are wanting to shoot. A good website to give you some basic info and reviews is dpreview.com