help with my new camera

[amyscott]

finally got myself a better camera , the konica minolta 8mp dimage a200 , it seems to be a cross between a compact and a dslr as it has all the settings of a dslr , manual exposures etc and was wondering if anybody has any tips , for now im just looking to photograph constelations to practice using it but not sure of what settings to use as no stars are showing up

pic of camera attatched

many thanks

[Shibby]

Hi Amy,

I can think of a couple of reasons you're not getting stars to show up...

- Focus; How are you focusing?

- Exposure settings; Try a 30s exposure, maximum aperture, min focal length (zoomed all the way out), high ISO (say 800) and see what you get!

[amyscott]

thanks , think i can do all that on my camera , but how do you change the aperture??

[amyscott]

also , what focus do i need and how do i change it

thanks

[Shibby]

Aperture on a camera is confusingly presented as "F number". The biggest possible aperture is the lowest F number, which I believe is F/2.8 in your case. F/2.8 is actually the F ratio (aperture / focal length), which is why it changes when you alter the aperture.

Focus should be at infinity (the sideways 8-ish symbol), but most lenses focus just beyond infinity. It can be hard to focus on a dark sky, some people use a "bahtinov mask" to achieve this but focusing on the moon, if available, will be a good enough start!

[amyscott]

thanks , done most them settings now , just cant find where to change the focus settings

[Cornelius Varley]

I see a button on the left side of the camera body marked AF/M (autofocus /manual ) ?

Peter