Hands-on with the Nikon D5000

By Rich Trenholm | April 15, 2009 | 1

As our colleagues over at CNET UK discovered, the D5000 is full of fun and games.

As we reported yesterday, Nikon has announced the D5000, a new digital SLR positioned between the D90 and D60. As the popular D40 reaches the end of its life, the D60 becomes the entry-level model, effectively raising the expected standard of the baseline dSLR.

This leaves us in two minds about the camera. On the one hand, it's a reasonably priced, tasty little dSLR with something for everyone. On the other, that very price and feature set place it higher in the food chain than Nikon seems to think, at AU$1499. Pricing doubts aside, the D5000 is a pick'n'mix of all sorts of Nikon goodness. It has the same sensor as the D90, a 12.3-megapixel CMOS, with an Expeed processor doing the thinking. There's an 11-point autofocus system and, like the D90, 720p video.

Click through our photos for more.

We weren't able to shoot any test shots with the pre-production models, but we were able to get to grips with the controls. There are a number of different status displays available on the screen, each simpler than the last. Scene modes and other shooting options display with sample images to show what the effect will be and how your photo will turn out.

This has freed Nikon to add more complicated scene modes and options, which can be explained simply to new users by the sample image. The idea is to inspire dSLR newbies to explore the more technical-sounding of the 19 scene settings, such as high and low-key lighting modes.

Other features include picture-editing options like a soft focus mode that detects faces and smoothes skin tones while blurring the rest of the picture in a pleasing manner. Perspective outline makes a line drawing out of your image, and perspective control corrects, er, perspective.

While Canon has added a dedicated video button to the EOS 500D, Nikon still makes you lock focus and hit the OK button, which isn't that intuitive as far as we're concerned.

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Settings and live view are shown off on this 69mm (2.7-inch) LCD screen.

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The D5000 includes 19 scene modes. We're still confused by the absence of video on the mode wheel.

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Instead, you point the camera at what you want to shoot, hit OK and choose video. Oh, but only in live view mode. Got that?

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You can manually adjust focus while filming, as well as tweaking exposure compensation and white balance.

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The screen folds away when you're using the viewfinder...

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...or flips out for multi-angle viewing.

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The screen twists at different angles to avoid glare, or for shooting with the camera held above you or down low.

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The Nikon D5000 will be available for AU$1499 for the body only, or AU$1699 with the 18-55 VR kit lens.

(Credit: CBS Interactive)