Opinion on these Nikon Lenses

I have a Nikon D3000, with 2 lenses. I can't seem to get crisp clear photos with either one, or different settings. I'm wanting to start this professionaly in the next year and have been practicing on my kids/seniors/etc… I'm just not happy with the quality… Please help.

here are the lenses I have!

AF-S nikkor 55-200mm 1:4-5.6g ED

AF-S nikkor 18-55mm 1:3-5.6 G

both have VR… Do I need different lense or am I just not using my camera properly?

The lens are fine, point them at a well lit subject and they will give you good photos, point them at badly lit subjects and they will give you bad looking photos,

point them badly at something at you will get photos that look bad,

the camera and lens capture what YOU point them at, so think about lighting and what your pointing your camera at,

---… The more you learn about lighting the better your pictures will become, thats the bottom line of photography ---…

- like i summed up your last question: its all about light… You can buy 1000 lenses they will still only be as good as you and record what you point them at…

I'm not going to preach I promise. One thing about taking photography classes before the advent of all these "idiot proof" cameras was that we were forced to actually learn the basics of how the lens speed and aperture were related. My SLR had a built in light meter but shutter speed and aperture setting was totally up to me. I'm not faulting you as I have my new Canon set on automatic and it works fine for normal photography. Where these cameras fail is when you are trying to get clear photos of subjects that are in motion, (like kids). Remember that a smaller aperture will always give you more depth of field and minimize the out of focus caused by moving subjects.So, set the cameras to manual controlled aperture at a high f stop and let it set the speed to match. Also, take the silly thing off auto-focus and try using your own eye instead. So don't blame the lenses. Find yourself an older photography book that explains the relationships of shutter speed, film speed, and aperture F-Stop size so you can better understand how everything fits. You are not using film of course but you are setting your pixel saturation which is very similar. Good luck and don't get frustrated, just get better through learning.