k200d and Pentax-M 28mm lens

Have bought an old 28mm f2.8 K mount lens for my K200 and having
problems getting the camera to respond in anyway apart from
F-- flashing in the lcd panel.Can anyone give me some ideas
at what I should or shouldn't be doing to get over this so I
can get out and use this lens.Thanks in anticipation.

Hi Peter. I recently tried one of these with my GX20. Very nice lens.
Assuming this is an SMC-M, you need the camera in Manual exposure mode. The F-- will always remain because the camera has no way to communicate with the lens and find out what aperture it's set at.

Use the aperture ring on the lens to select the desired aperture, then press the green button just to the right of the sutter release. This stops the lens down to your selected aperture value and meters the light coming through the lens. The camera will then set the shutter speed to give correct exosure. Then you can take the shot in the normal way.

You'll probably find that this "stop down metering" method sometimes gives hit and miss results, but you can always use it as a starting point and then manually adjust the shutter speed to get the exposure you want.

If the lens is an SMC-A, you use it as above or you can move the aperture ring onto the "A" setting. The camera can then communicate with the lens and you can use the APerture priority mode.

Don't forget that you can also check focus by half pressing the shutter and making sure the green focus light comes on.

Unless you've already done so, you might need to change a setting in the camera menus to allow use of the aperture ring on lenses (otherwise the camera won't work).

The in focus beep/light can be a bit out - try to learn to use your own eyes to decide what's in focus. I've had much better results since I started ignoring the beep and using the MK1 eyeball with manual lenses.

Edit, not sure about the K200D but my Km will also support Av mode with manual lenses - it just meters and shoots with the lens set to the largest aperture. This makes them a lot more useful for photographing moving subjects at a distance as you merely have to focus and shoot.

I know that's also true for the K10D, K20D and K-7, so I expect it applies to all the digital models. It's certainly useful for old lenses that perform well wide open, however it can often be important to stop a lens down, so M mode should be mastered as well.

Thank you for the advice and taking the time to post it.I found a setting
in the Record Mode menu called Input Focal Length - did just that(28mm)and,
bingo, the camera and lens are working fine.Well pleased with this new acquisition(just been out in the snow shooting some pictures.)Once again
thanks to you guys.
Peter W.

Hold on, Input Focal Length is just for the Shake Reduction. You must have done something else to get it working! Congratulations anyway.

Believe me,Iceblinker(Pete?),that's all I did(I think).Anyway,the lens is
working fine in both manual and AV modes.I must admit as a 62 year old
technophobe some of this digitalisation is a bit bewildering ,but I love the K200 and it's re-ignited a long lost interest in photography.I'm now looking forward(?) to learning a little about image manipulation,etc. using
the computer.

Peter W.