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Congrats on your new camera. Be sure to exercise a lot of patience with yourself, because there is a learning curve to taking good animal photos with any camera. Here are some answers to your questions, and some other tips:

1/ You can get a solid background by fastening a cloth backdrop to the wall behind your subject. This can be dark or light as you prefer. Try to get it as wrinkle free as possible. When shooting, place your subject far enough in front of the backdrop that your subject is in sharp focus and the backdrop is out of focus. This way, you will get the nice contrast to show off the animal, but small imperfections such as wrinkles, lint, etc. won't be in focus and won't show in the photos.

2/ Getting live animal shots is not easy and requires patience, tricks, multiple shots (and sessions), and some luck. I would never chill a chondro to get a photo. I have found that having your subject on a removable perch is a huge plus for obtaining nice poses. Trying to remove a chondro from a perch and then attempting to get it to reposition itself for a photo is often a lost cause. This is especially true for "wanderers"... those animals which never sit still when out of the cage. It is often difficult to get a few shots off even when using the removable perch technique with such animals.

I get animals to pose for photos by using various tricks, such as lightly touching them on the head, blowing at them, tapping the perch with my fingers, cupping a hand over them momentarily, and other such techniques to cause them to pause for a few moments. Shy animals that hide their head can usually be provoked into showing their face for a few seconds by poking them lightly on the underside. Have your camera and lights set up and be ready to shoot fast when you get that perfect shot.

I often take 15-20 shots per animal. Some of this is due to trying some different camera settings, but mostly I am looking for just that right pose, along with the perfect camera angle. The combination of pose, angle, light, and shadow, are what is called composition. This is an important element in good photography, and is often what separate amateurish looking snapshots from really nice photos. It is almost impossible to get that great shot you are looking for with just one or two exposures. I often find that one image out of the dozens I just took is the perfect shot, and sometimes it is not the shot I thought would be the best. Only by looking at the fisnished shots can you really tell which are superior and which are candidates for the delete button.

I consider using a tripod (along with the camera's self timer function), a perch holding device (I use a bicycle mechanic's stand, see photo at the top of this forum), and good lighting to be indispensable tools for high quality chondro photography. Do yourself a huge favor and get a good book or two on basic photography. Understanding exposure, depth of field, focus, and other camera functions will help greatly. Even better, sign up for a class at your local camera store. Have fun and good luck!