I think every single model horse hobbiest has struggled with lighting and cameras at least once. I struggle with it every time I take a picture, because no matter what happens, my pictures either come out blurry, pixellated, too bright, or too dark, or my camera chooses to focus on something other then the horse. It’s really frustrating because I’m so picky.
The smartest thing I ought to do is just go outside to take pictures. 😛 Natural light usually gives me good results. But seeing as it’s winter and dark and cloudy most of the time now… I want to get artificial lighting right.
Christmas brought me this sweet new lamp, (and new ponies yay!) which I’ve clamped on to the back of my desk. It’s magnifying so it’ll be really helpful for tackmaking, but best of all it’s light is white!
I decided to have a go at taking some pictures of my new models. (S Justadream and Andrea’s Answer) Fiddled with the camera’s settings a bit, and these were the results. (with very little editing in photoshop…)
S Justadream’s picture is too blue tinted for my tastes, though, and I still am not completely happy with the pictures. I should play around with one of the fancier cameras my dad owns… hahaha… >_> But it’s one step closer, which is a good thing.
Trial and error, trial and error… someday I’ll get it right!
Desktop Stables 
I agree, natural light is a must have whenever possible.