Remember traveling back in the days before smartphones? If a serious amateur picture-taker, you dragged along a big camera bag. In it, along with the Nikon, several extra lenses, a flash unit and a heavy stash of 35mm film rolls.

Now in the digital age, you can do it all with just a Nikon or other compact brand. One very small camera, including flash, tele and wide-angle lenses and virtually unlimited pictures. And in some, you can also shoot video. However, this very old travel4seniors.com editor observes, too many senior travelers just point and shoot without considering the potential picture quality of each click. Here are a few simple rules, some from as far back as Civil War photographer Matthew Brady.

The sun and other light sources should beam from behind you, with full brightness hitting your subject, whether family group, marching band or scenic ocean vista. At night and in darkened daytime areas, use the flash, but not too close up.

If you want to be in your photo and use a selfie stick, be sure you hold it far enough away so the result doesn’t become a distorted picture of your arms holding a stick in the middle of the photo. Still better, ask someone else to shoot the picture.

There’s no film involved, so feel free to take multiple shots from different angles at important events and locations. You may just get a celebrity smile, historic sports moment or humorously embarrassing no-no.