Nikon Coolpix 5700




Well if you pay much attention to this site, you'll notice that I'm now shooting primarily with a Canon EOS-10D. Does the fact that I have changed my primary camera mean that I have a dislike for the Coolpix 5700? Not at all. It just doesn't have the capabilities that I am after. However, for someone who is beyond "simple point and shoot", but not quite to the "amateur" status, the 5700 is a good little camera.

If you are interested in one, I'd highly suggest reading the review of it at Digital Photography Review (see my website resources section here). I won't waste my time (or yours) going over the technical details that are all spelled out quite nicely there... rather, I'll just offer a few things that come to mind in regards to the camera and my experience with it.

- The ability to record video with audio is really cool. The quality isn't necessarily all that great (it is "good" just not as high quality as the pictures the camera takes), but it's a great feature to have available from time to time. For example, I was driving on a back road in Colorado last summer, and suddenly found myself surrounded by a cattle drive. I stopped the car as the cowboys (and cowgirls) moved their stock right past me... as they were approaching, I was thinking to myself that my neice and nephew would love to be able to see this, and hear how loud they were. So I pulled out the camera, switched to video mode... and you get the picture. The point is, without the sound of a cow stopping 18 inches from my open window and mooing loudly, it just would not have been the same. That having been said, one complaint about the audio aspect - the mic is too close to the lens, and so it pics up a "click-click-click" as the lens refocuses on any moving objects. It can be avoided at times, and isn't terrible, but it is quite noteworthy.

- For what it can do (primarily for the zoom capability of its' lens), it is surprisingly small and lightweight. A bit too small for my big hands actually, but it was very easy to take wherever you wanted.

- As a plus to the photographer who knows a bit more than your average point-and-shooter, the camera has a "manual" mode. While this is a nice feature to see on a camera in this category, don't get too excited about it until you realize one of the frustrations that I ran into. It seems that at any given focal length, you have two apeture options. TWO. That's it. When you zoom in or out, *what* those options are do in fact change, but there seem to only be two.

- The fact that the camera has a bulb setting, is pretty danged cool. However, I can't imagine that it's capability to go to a max of five minutes could ever be helpful - the sensor noise is too bad. I cannot imagine anything with an exposure time of more than 90-120 seconds as being usable. (True, depending on what it is, you could clean up the noise with Photoshop or the like... but... *shrug*)

...well, if I think of anything else of particular import, I'll add it. Otherwise, I'll refer you again to Digital Photography Review, if you're thinking about picking up a Coolpix 5700.

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