Nikon D5000

With a good balance of advanced features and automatic functions, as well as Nikon's D-Movie mode, can the D5000 give the competition a run for its money? Josie Reavely finds out

Following in the footsteps of the D90 – which pioneered Nikon’s D-Movie mode – comes the D5000: a versatile enthusiast-level DSLR with HD movie-making capability.

With its HD (1280x720) D-Movie mode and Live View features complimented by a new 2.7” Vari-angle LCD, the D5000 invites you to “View life from any angle”. Toted as a ‘new breed of digital camera’ Nikon has sought to combine the performance and image quality offered by the rest of their DSLR range with the spontaneity achieved by shooting movies as well as stills that you get with a compact. This is the second DSLR that they have attempted this with, the aforementioned D90 receiving a generally positive response from the photographic community.

While perhaps not every photographer is ready (or indeed, in need of) a camera that can shoot still and moving images, the benefits of shooting movies with a DSLR are several. For one, you automatically have a fantastic range of interchangeable lenses at your disposal, allowing you to introduce exciting creative effects into your video work, as well as offering you greater control than you’d perhaps have with an entry-level camcorder or digital compact with a fixed lens. It’s admittedly still early days for DSLR manufacturers – particularly seeing as no-one’s cracked the problem of letting users shoot video with full-time AF yet - no doubt we’ll see vast improvements in the technology with subsequent camera launches. However for now, Nikon has chosen to stick with the system that they introduced with their first video-capable DSLR. More on this momentarily.

The D5000 continues the Nikon tradition of providing good quality, well-built DSLRs, feeling solid, ergonomically sculpted and comfortable in the hand, if slightly less sturdy than the pricier D90. The areas where your fingers and thumb grip the camera are rubberised for maximum purchase and comfort, and the camera feels perfectly weighted with the 18-55mm VR kit lens attached.

Seasoned Nikon users will feel instantly at home with the D5000’s uncomplicated interface, with clearly labelled and conveniently located controls spaced evenly across the camera’s outer surface. Similarly, those migrating from other systems or a compact and picking up the camera for the first time shouldn’t have any trouble in familiarising themselves with the D5000’s controls: everything is clearly labelled and there’s in-camera ‘Help’ accessed via a button labelled ‘?’ on the back if you need clarification on what any of the settings does.

On the top of the camera there’s a tactile silver shutter release surrounded by the power switch, the shutter release offers a positive action and there’s a reassuring halfway point that’s easily identified when half-depressing the shutter. An Info button turns the all-encompassing information display that appears on the rear LCD on and off and alongside, a dedicated button offers access to the camera’s exposure compensation control. Next to these you’ll find the fully stocked mode dial, with ridged edges for a firmer purchase, and a positive action.

The rest of the controls reside on the back of the camera, with the new 2.7” Vari-angle LCD taking centre-stage, which we’ll look at in detail shortly. Down the left hand side of the LCD there’s the usual array of Playback, Menu and Zoom buttons, above a somewhat mysterious button simply labelled ‘i’. This is the Information Edit button, which has the effect of making the information displayed on the LCD interactive. This allows you to make quick changes to key settings like Image Quality, ISO, Release and AF-area modes and keeps you from having to delve into the menu system too often. This system works well and helps to make up for the lack of other dedicated buttons that you find on larger, higher spec models from Nikon that have more ‘real estate’ on which to place them. To the right of the LCD, a dedicated Lv button offers direct access to the D5000’s Live View feature, and a further press of the OK button in the centre of the four-way controller breathes life into the camera’s D-Movie mode.

The D5000 marks somewhat of a departure from the tried-and-tested Nikon DSLR format, what with the introduction of its newly-developed LCD to compliment its Live View and D-Movie modes, and its name differentiates it from the rest of the DSLR line-up. It also has the effect of making it slightly confusing for the consumer to figure out whereabouts it sits in Nikon’s DSLR hierarchy. To clarify, the D5000 currently runs alongside (just below) the D90, and so sits above the entry-level D60. It’s not a D90 replacement – rather a smaller, lighter version with a lot of the same great features.

To return to the new LCD, it’s a shade smaller than that of some of its competitors, and it sports an admittedly lower 230,000-dot resolution. This only matters when comparing cameras on paper as far as we’re concerned. Once we were out in the field with this camera, we found the level of brightness and wide viewing angle mean that the screen more than fulfils the purpose for which its designed: to enhance the creativity gained by the D5000’s Live View / movie capability. The monitor is very clear, bright and easily viewed from just about every angle. An excellent anti-reflective coating on the surface of the LCD means it’s very usable in bright conditions too. All of these factors mean that you’re able to quickly zoom into and pan around images in Playback mode, checking images for sharpness and focus with ease. You’re also able to zoom into images while shooting in Live View mode to ascertain accurate focus, safe in the knowledge that you can rely on what you’re seeing on the screen.

Then there’s the fact that it’s not stuck to the back of the camera: you can flip the LCD out, rotate it and position it at all manner of odd angles in order to shoot high and low (or – as Nikon is keen to point out in their promotional video – around corners). We were a little sceptical regarding its usefulness at first, although once we got used to photographing objects making full use of the screen’s capabilities, we discovered just how versatile this feature really is. The hinge on which the LCD rests offers a smooth, gliding action and the screen stays put wherever you angle it. You can obviously stick to having it in the traditional spot on the back of the camera - where you still benefit from its wide viewing angle and anti-reflective coating – or you can flip it over and clip it face-down to the back of the camera, for protection when it’s not in use.

The positioning of the hinge towards the bottom of the camera means that Nikon hasn’t sacrificed the easy-to-navigate control layout, but we did find one drawback. Once you have the camera mounted on a tripod (as Nikon recommends, particularly when shooting movies) the tripod plate hampers the movement of the LCD – which isn’t ideal.

Of course, if you’re not an avid Live View shooter, you can simply shoot looking through the viewfinder, which is also very clear, bright, and offers 95% frame coverage.

One point of note is that – like Nikon’s existing entry-level models – the D5000 lacks an in-built AF motor, so if you want to take advantage of the camera’s responsive 11-point AF system, you’ll need to invest in – or already own – AF-S lenses. If this is a deal-breaker, you’re better off opting for the D90, which does support older, non-AF-S lenses (and has a larger, higher resolution – albeit fixed – LCD). The D5000 does support the full complement of Creative Lighting System products however, as well as an optional IR remote and Nikon’s GP-1 GPS system, among others.

Image quality from the D5000 is outstanding. There are plenty of manual and automatic exposure modes to cover just about every situation, as well as a powerful built-in pop-up flash that sports an array of modes to help you achieve the most natural looking results. There are Picture Controls to let you customise the way your images look in-camera, and you get Nikon’s excellent dynamic range optimising feature - Active D-Lighting – thrown into the mix too. Straight out of the camera, images are faithfully coloured, sharp and vibrant. The camera’s a joy to shoot with and the results are very good indeed, with the D5000 coping with just about anything we pointed its lens at.

The camera’s Live View feature proved capable, if not the most responsive system we’ve used to date. In comparison to its direct competition, the D5000 fares well, offering a range of AF modes to cope with an array of situation, although we can’t help but think it’s not quite making full use of that versatile new LCD.

As we mentioned before, the D5000’s inherited the D90’s D-Movie mode, with no tweaks or enhancements made to it, so it still captures movies at 24fps and can shoot at HD-quality for up to 5 minutes. It’s also still the case that you have to focus manually while shooting video (at the same time as fiddling with the swivelling LCD) and it offers the same mono audio recording capability. The D5000’s movies also suffer from the same problem of verticals becoming skewed if you pan too quickly, and colours aren’t as vibrant as those recorded in still images. Don’t get us wrong though – it’s still a huge improvement over anything you could shoot with a compact. We suspect you wouldn’t want to buy this camera purely for its video capability, but it’s still a handy feature to have on hand and should offer decent enough results to satisfy its target market.

Final Verdict The D5000 is a versatile DSLR that's well suited to photographers who perhaps want to retain the flexibility offered by a compact when they upgrade OVERALL

Josie developed a taste for photography while travelling around Ecuador, returning home to specialize in the medium as part of her BA (Hons) degree at university. Now the Reviews Editor for Digital Photographer, Josie handles all of the latest camera launches and boasts an in-depth knowledge of all things camera-related.