Dpreview review of the D7000

[peterb]

One word...WOW!

Another word....WANT!

I've held in the store and for the first time in a looooong time I've found a DSLR that feels just right to me. Great balance and layout.

The lens set I saw was no slouch either. With a 12-24mm f4 (18-36mm) and a 24-120mm (36-180mm) range in just two optics and its incredible (from what I saw anyway) high ISO performance to 6400 the versatility is pretty high. So is the DR...a whopping 9.3 eV!

Spend a little more and get the 24mm f1.4 and 85mm f1.4 if you'd like for two incredible low light primes and you'll really be prepared.

Ah now to go rob a bank.

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/nikond7000/

 

[ptomsu]

I am interested in the D7000 myself as a backup compact DSLR for my FF D700 equipment.

Issue is that on the Internet you can find many reviews, which are not as bright as the one from DPReviw - unfortunately.

Not sure what to do - an option would be Pentax K5 but actually I hate to open another system.

 

[Terry]

I haven't read every detail but is seemed like they were having some issues with overexposure.... These camera have been out in the wild for a bit. Any word on the street that it is an issue?

 

[DonWeston]

I am having some issues with focus more then anything else...had it bout a week so far and shot 3k images. so far I like my D300 better....

 

[Amin]

I am interested in the D7000 myself as a backup compact DSLR for my FF D700 equipment.

Issue is that on the Internet you can find many reviews, which are not as bright as the one from DPReviw - unfortunately.

Not sure what to do - an option would be Pentax K5 but actually I hate to open another system.

Peter, if you're looking to complement a D700, the D7000 seems like a no-brainer compared to the K-5. Maybe you're overthinking this?

 

[Jorgen Udvang]

Reading a dpreview test, most cameras seem to be great. Reading the dpreview forums, all cameras seem to be trash. This forum looks like one of just a handful camera-fora on the internet where I would trust the opinion of those participating in the discussions... did I say a handful? Make that two or three.

I don't doubt for a second that the D7000 is a great camera. If I was going to choose the K5 instead, it would be because of IBIS or the Limited primes. In other areas, any of the cameras may or may not be slightly better in some areas, but it's a tossup really. They share the same sensor, they both have great ergonomics and a good viewfinder, they are of similar size. It's the lenses, man, the lenses :deadhorse:

 

[Amin]

Reading a dpreview test, most cameras seem to be great. Reading the dpreview forums, all cameras seem to be trash.

So true .

 

[ptomsu]

Reading a dpreview test, most cameras seem to be great. Reading the dpreview forums, all cameras seem to be trash. This forum looks like one of just a handful camera-fora on the internet where I would trust the opinion of those participating in the discussions... did I say a handful? Make that two or three.

I don't doubt for a second that the D7000 is a great camera. If I was going to choose the K5 instead, it would be because of IBIS or the Limited primes. In other areas, any of the cameras may or may not be slightly better in some areas, but it's a tossup really. They share the same sensor, they both have great ergonomics and a good viewfinder, they are of similar size. It's the lenses, man, the lenses :deadhorse:

In This case you are totally wrong! The Dpreview review is a good one this time, but if you check for other reviews on the net, you will find much more mixed results.

Which does not say anything about the quality of these reviews of course.

 

[peterb]

Couldn't the AF and over exposure issues be addressed with a modification in the firmware?

 

[ptomsu]

Couldn't the AF and over exposure issues be addressed with a modification in the firmware?

Think that should work, question for me remains why Nikon having this long year experience with DSLRs release such an important new model if not ready?

 

[RomanJohnston]

I haven't read every detail but is seemed like they were having some issues with overexposure.... These camera have been out in the wild for a bit. Any word on the street that it is an issue?

I would say that with any camera, exposure is the responsibility of the operator, not the camera.

Roman

 

[Terry]

I would say that with any camera, exposure is the responsibility of the operator, not the camera.

Roman

Perhaps if you want to do everything manually....but if the user wants to buy a camera based on features that it has, those features should work. Personally, when shooting manual, it is nice to have an indication of the metered exposure with a scale of how much over or underexposed it would be....and yes i would expect that scale to be less than .5 to 1.0 stop off.

 

[RomanJohnston]

I have yet to find ANY camera that exposes properly 100% of the time. Photography is a craft. If you have found one that does perfectly all the time...please, let me know.

Roman

 

[Terry]

I have yet to find ANY camera that exposes properly 100% of the time. Photography is a craft. If you have found one that does perfectly all the time...please, let me know.

Roman

We agree proper exposure - this is what I was referring to:

"There's one negative point though that we have to mention. As you can see from the examples on this page, the camera has a tendency to overexpose, particularly in bright conditions. During our tests we shoot hundreds of real-life samples and with any camera there are usually a few incorrectly exposed images. On the D7000 however the correct/incorrect ratio is a little higher than usual which suggests that the camera's 3D matrix metering could do with a bit of a tweak. The overexposure is usually in the region between 0.5 and 1.0EV and can in most cases be corrected in RAW conversion. Nevertheless, when shooting in bright sunshine and/or high contrast conditions you might want to keep an eye on the histogram and apply exposure compensation where necessary.

More adventurous users might also consider using the 'Fine Tune Optimal Exposure' control in the custom menu, but we'd urge caution here - this control is a universal bias, irrespective of scene type. In our experience, it is only in bright lighting conditions where the D7000 tends to struggle."

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/nikond7000/page16.asp

 

[ptomsu]

I have yet to find ANY camera that exposes properly 100% of the time. Photography is a craft. If you have found one that does perfectly all the time...please, let me know.

Roman

Well,

I think that I know multiple DSLRs over the last 10 years as I owned them and I do NOT agree that the camera should not be able to do proper exposure - I mean not perfect, this remains to the photographer, but at least 90 - 95%.

Nikon DSLRs are known for doing that really good since many years, so it is quite unusual that the D7000 is an exception here.

 

[RomanJohnston]

Every camera I have owned has its own "personality" with exposure. Some over expose, some under expose. Some even do both based on the scene before them and the algorithm processing the scene. (IE ratio of dark to light in the scene).

The only constant I have found is me. If I learn exposure and how my tool sees (or improperly sees) I can adjust and shoot with any camera no matter it's nature.

My D70 constantly under exposed if I relied on the meter. My D2H was pretty good, but would hedge lightly to under exposure. My D2X would under expose a little much like the D2H, my D300 seems to underexpose and over expose as well as nail exposure.

Again...I have never found a camera that can handle everything thrown at it. If the D7000 has a slight over exposure in certain situations. Learn it and move on. But don't make it deal killer...because the next camera you look at will have its own issues with certain scenes that throw the meter off. It's that simple.

If anyone finds that exposure is the most important thing in their photograph (and most should) they should learn that no camera is perfect and somewhere along the line they will have to become part of the process if they want their success rate to improve.

Roman

 

[Jorgen Udvang]

Nah... my D80 underexposed by around half a stop routinely, and I think most of them did. Nikon was never able to fix it. Now, it overexposes randomly, but that's probably just a sign that the motherboard is dying.

I don't worry too much about these things, as long as it's consistent. After a few thousand shots, one learns to know the camera.

 

[ptomsu]

Nah... my D80 underexposed by around half a stop routinely, and I think most of them did. Nikon was never able to fix it. Now, it overexposes randomly, but that's probably just a sign that the motherboard is dying.

I don't worry too much about these things, as long as it's consistent. After a few thousand shots, one learns to know the camera.

What scares me is that it seems not to be consistent.

 

[jonoslack]

I'm with Roman on this one.
Every camera has it's own character . . . and that doesn't just mean every model of camera.
My M9s expose differently, so did my two E1s.
You just get to know what's going on and keep a look at the histogram.
If I fancied the D7000 for other reasons, then I certainly wouldn't let a little remark like that from dPreview put me off.

. . . . and anyway, it was a really GOOD review.

 

[RomanJohnston]

Yeah...it was an awesome review. I might actually "upgrade" from my D300 to this camera. Better DR, same features that I currently use (Live view, MLU, water resistant body, 14bit, etc) and it's lighter.

Sounds like a win win to me.

Roman