SD300 - Night photography help?

[grd601]

Hi All,
I just purchased a sd300 and would like some input re: taking night pictures. When I go camping etc, when I try to take a night picture I have one of two problems: If I use the flash, the picture just comes out like it's during the day, if I don't use the flash, it's too dark (the light from the campfire doesn't seem to help). I've been using my old camera (the S200) up to this point and I'm wondering what type of settings I should be using to take "campfire" pictures.

Thanks for any help
Dan

[Alnath]

THIS (http://alnath.fotopic.net/p8944408.html) was a 15 second exposure, f2 at ISO 50 if thats any help

[Need4Spd]

A couple of hints. Be sure to select "menu" then scroll down to enable "long shutter." This will ensure you get the max exposure time from the shutter. I'm not sure why you can choose to enable it or not.

You can also try the "night mode" setting. Select "function" button then cursor to the right to get the night mode icon (person with star over his head and eiffel tower). This will give you relatively slow shutter speed to reveal dim objects but some fill flash to illuminate things close. You still have to hold the camera very steady or you'll blur. I'm not sure if you simply just choose the night mode (man with star) icon by cycling through the flash modes and you get the same thing or not.