Hey /p/, I am getting a DSLR on Tuesday, and will be flying

The best practice is changing settings in manual and taking pictures of landmarks near your house. However you can usually shoot in automatic as long as you at least focus manually.

Honestly, just playing around with manual settings is a good idea. But just putting it on Auto and focusing manually is a good start as well. Everyone learns at a different pase though so it just kinda depends on your knowledge of photography already,

>>2903713
Try watching histograms and of course editing a few images that you shoot now.

Automatics are pretty good on good modern cameras. You will get a lot of good pictures if you only shoot halfway reasonably with a decent camera.

>>2903713
a6300

>>2903715
>>2903722
To be perfectly honest, I wouldn't recommend manual focus to a beginner in a situation such as this. The kit lenses have very poor manual focus throws. DSLRs in general don't have a very good focusing screen for manual use (no microprism ring or split prim, just a matte screen instead)