My nikon d40 takes black images?

I have a nikon d40 and when i take a picture the image shows up black on the LCD screen and when i pop the card in the computer the image is still all black. It seems to be doing everything right to take the picture but there's NO PICTURE… I'm going crazy, will someone please help me before i throw it down the street…

Black images means that you are grossly underexposing your images

Use the camera light meter to assure near perfect exposures

http://camerasim.com/camera-simulator/

There's a million things that could be causing a 'black' picture. Is the lens cap on? What settings are you using? It could just be that everything is horribly underexposed because you've managed to upset the exposure inadvertently.

I'd verify that the lens cap is off and then set the camera to an automatic exposure mode, something like aperture priority or full auto. If this still results in 'black' photos, then something more involved is happening that might require the camera to be shipped off to repaired.

Hope that helps!

Mine does that when I take pictures of ***'s!

Set your camera mode dial to Auto. While more manually set controls may be potentially more optimum, they can be way wrong. Auto should be good or very close. If you are getting blacked out pictures in Auto then it is probably a camera malfunction. If the results in Auto are good it was probably some bad setting choice blacking out the pictures.

Set to P mode, EV to 0, ISO to Auto, and White Balance to Auto. Go out and look for a brightly colored car parked under the sun and take a picture form about 12 feet. If no picture comes out even after you press the Preview button, the digital sensor is busted.

You can have the sensor replaced. Ask first how much it would take. If it's over $500, buy a new dSLR instead. The D40 is a classic camera. I'd really hate to see it die just like that.