Meeting up and joining with fellow photographers is a great way to hone your craft. Think about it: Everyone meets up in a vocation like this, from cyclists to soccer players. It's only natural that photographers group together. Holding friendly little competitions and exploring the world together can improve your skills.
When taking a photo, try to use any kind of lighting other than your camera's flash. The flash creates unnatural photos and dark spots in a picture. If you absolutely need to use the flash, tape a small piece of white paper over the flash. This will diffuse the light, making for softer, more natural lighting in the photos.
Carry a point-and-shoot camera with you everywhere you go. By always being prepared to snap a shot when you feel inspired, you can hone your technique in unexpected places. Since practicing is one of the best ways to become a better photographer, taking loads of photos wherever you go can help you develop your style and improve your photography in general.
Use Photoshop to whiten your subject's teeth. Upload your images to your software program, and manually brush brightness onto the teeth. It is going to give the subject a natural looking white smile. Simple changes like this are going to go a long way in making the subject look great.
A good photography trick that can help you out is to focus on a particular spot in front of the action if you're taking an action shot. If you simply try to take a picture of the action itself you might miss it entirely. It's better to focus on an area in front of the action.
If you would like to explore the forgotten art of film photography, but worry about the costs associated with development, consider setting up your own little dark room in the basement. You can even set up a portable dark room in a washroom. Since most photographers have switched to digital, you can often find inexpensive dark room equipment at thrift stores and on internet sites.
With these suggestions in hand, start looking at your most recent photographs and see if these tips would have made the pictures even better. If you start noticing that there is a suggestion or two that would greatly improve a few of the photographs you've already taken, try finding a way to incorporate that suggestion into every photograph you take from now on.