How to set Nikon d5100 on live view to take pictures?

Just bought the nikon d5100 I would love to take pictures through the LCD screen. The viewfinder works as it should but the monitor stays black when trying to take pictures, it does work for info, menu, and looking at pictures already taken.

Read your manual

live view is inferior to the viewfinder in pretty much every way. Why would you want to use it?

No serious photographer uses Live View on DSLRs because it sucks (except for some studio photography). Anyway, the Live View switch is right next to the mode dial and it even says "Lv" for Live View. If you had taken a minute or less you could have easily found it in the manual or google.

Here:

Are you telling us that you want to turn a nearly $1, 000 dSLR into nothing more than a P&S camera.

Holding a camera at arms length will cause all kinds of camera movement with in turn will cause a lot of blurred photos.

The live view is there so you can shoot video (with the camera mounted on a tripod), mount the camera on a telescope or microscope, shooting macro shots in unusual positions or take photos of a welders arc without damaging your eye.

You need so spend some time reading your user manual, specifically page 26 to see how to assure very steady shots when hand holding the camera

Page 99 and 100 discusses how to activate the live view mode

If reading and studying the Owner's Manual for your camera is too tedious then at least watch this video tutorial: http://www.nikondigitutor.com/eng/d5100/index.html Who better than Nikon to teach you to use your Nikon D5100?