Advicd for a novice

Hi all
I am an absolute novice and have always used a digital point and shoot,i have owned a Olympus E410 for a year but rarely used it due to not having the know how.anyway i am going to give it a go if anyone can help.
1. I am going to take pics of a party indoors at a social club i need to know the best settings to use with a flash so the pics dont come out dark and grainy like the did when i last tried i only used the auto settings,

2. Whats the best settings for outdoor use in cloudy conditions

thanks to anyone who can help, please keep it simple no technical stuff please

Russ T

Hi Russ,
You don't say which flash you are using but I assume it is just the small pop-up flash on the camera.
While these are very convenient, they have very little power - hence the dark/grainy pictures. Anything more than about 10-15 feet away is stretching the power of the flash.
It is good for fill-in flash on cloudy days, but again, you must be closer.
Generally - especially for a novice - the P mode and leaving the flash on AUTO is a good bet. However, outdoors the flash may not fire at all if the camera feels there is enough light. If you change the flash setting from AUTO to just the flash symbol (it looks like a little lightning bolt) that will force the camera to use the flash all the time. Should work better on a cloudy day.
Steve

thanx