New Nikon D5000 SLR Announced. Stills, Video, and More!

New Nikon D5000 Digital SLR Camera does still photography and video

The new Nikon D5000 SLR gives us Nikon owners a good reason to upgrade. Several good reasons actually.

Pre-Order Now At A Very Reasonable Price

For one thing, the price is reasonable. Amazon has a kit including the Nikon D5000 Camera with an 18-55mm VR Lens available for pre-order now for only $849.

Another kit including the Nikon D5000 Camera with two lenses is listed as “out-of-stock” with no price. The Nikon D5000 body only is similarly listed without a price.

From past experience, I predict it will be very difficult to find one of these new Nikon cameras available to buy. So, if you want one,  pre-order the kit now. The Nikon 18mm-55mm f/3.5-5.6 VR Lens goes for about $130 by itself at Adorama . That makes the cost of the body only about $719. Not bad for a camera that does so much.

What’s New with the Nikon D5000?

There seems to be plenty that is new or improved with this camera. Here’s a list of some of the most interesting upgrades from Nikon’s website:

• Vari-angle color LCD monitor. Finally, a Nikon DSLR with a movable 2.7″ LCD for shooting low to the ground or high overhead.  The screen flips inward for safe keeping. Combine this with Nikon’s Live View and you’ll find yourself making pictures from all sorts of new angles. And, of course, there is an optical viewfinder too.
• D-Movie Mode with sound. You can record 720p HD movies with sound! And you can use any of your Nikon lenses. Most consumer-grade camcorders do not have interchangeable lenses. This is a big plus allowing you to refine the look of your video. You can play the movies back on your high-definition TV using the D5000′s built-in HDMI connector. Or save them in industry-standard AVI video format.
• 12.3 megapixel CMOS sensor. This is a DX-format , not a full-frame sensor. So, you’ll still get the advantage of lighter-weight lenses and the extra 1.5x zoom factor to get more out of your telephoto lenses. Nikon says it’s optimized for low noise at high ISO speeds. The D90 has excellent performance in this area, so the D5000 ought to do well too.
• High-speed stills at 4 frames-per-second! That’s fast enough for most action photography. Sure, the D3x does 8 fps, but it also costs about $8000 and weighs a ton.

Get it Now!

The Nikon D5000 looks like another winner from Nikon. Digital cameras have improved so much so quickly. If you are still using a D70 or another camera that’s more than a couple of years old, you’re missing out on a lot. These days the camera body you use is so important to your photography that it would be a shame not to take advantage of the high quality and advanced features of the newer cameras like the Nikon D5000 . Order one now!

Tagged as: camera, D5000, equipment, Nikon, photography, review