Your particular camera does have the ability to adjust settings manually, as well as an aperture priority and shutter priority mode. This is great if you want to start to experiment. Aperture and shutter priority are nice because you only set one thing, and the camera figures out the other setting for you so you get a proper exposure. Another setting to try to adjust every time you take a picture, is ISO. Your camera goes down to 80, and that setting will get you the best pictures. You may not be able to manually set the ISO unless you're in a manual setting, something other than auto. Keep in mind that at that ISO setting it will seem as though the camera gets less light, so it is important to have plenty of light available. You also need a tripod of some sort to really get the most out of your camera settings. Without a tripod you're generally limited to a shutter speed of no less than 1/60 of a second, or you'll have blurry pictures.
For lighting, unless you're purposely trying to show scratches and other imperfections of your knives, indirect lighting is best. On a sunny day you'd photograph in the shade. On a cloudy day you can photograph about anywhere. Get a piece of white posterboard to reflect light off of and put it near your knife. By moving it around you can see the effect it has as more or less light is reflected on your knife. Sometimes you need a little extra "kick" into the shadows to lighten things up and get the nice even look. Don't use the flash!
I often see photographs that use a cutting board as the background and that is certainly fitting, but you can also try using fabric of different types to great effect. Discount stores offer cheap fabric for a couple of bucks a yard. For knives, I would stick to dark fabrics and mostly black. If you can get an assitant to help, they're also great for holding above shiny knives to get that glossy black shadow instead of bright shiny reflection.
Getting a good picture has a lot more to do with the technique than the camera or even camera settings. Take a lot of pictures, and then just throw out the bad ones. With digital photography it doesn't cost you any more money to take 100 pictures vs 10, but the number of great pictures you'll get out of 100 will be much higher. Experiment with different camera angles and close ups. Try and show some detail through the camera that you notice with your eye and want others to see too.
So here are the bullet points;
- Use a tripod
- Indirect lighting
- Good background
- Interesting camera angles
- Fill in shadows with additional light
- Low ISO (80 is lowest for your camera)
- Take LOTS of pictures and plan to throw a lot of them out