Packed with features that make taking pictures easy and fun, this camera stands out above the competition with its unique vari-angle LCD monitor, which allows you to shoot easily from any angle you can imagine.

In terms of command and control, the D5000 is the same as the discontinued D40: you need menus to select among AF-S, AF-C and AF-A modes, AF-area modes, WB trims and etc. on thing I can't understand: why in this review camera specifications and shooting menu says two different things? D-Movie mode is good, but it doesn't autofocus as you shoot, so following action will be more difficult; and you also have no manual exposure control to influence either aperture (for better depth of field control) or shutter speed (for use in sports situations) in D-Movie mode.

Indeed, certain tripod heads with quick release levers on the back will prevent you from opening and twisting the LCD at all, including most Manfrotto designs. This is exactly how Panasonic does it on their bottom-hinged articulating swivel screens, though, so plenty of folks are already used to this method.

It can be quite annoying to get the camera back from the lab with this mode enabled, but at least it doesn't reset itself after each shot. Macro is a full-frame L-mount lens that's designed to be a medium telephoto, portrait and macro lens all-in-one. If the light is unfavorable and the D5000 can't really see what it's doing, it's not unusual that it will hang up and not focus, losing your picture, just as the D40 will do in very dim light. Is the extra optical oomph worth the upgrade over the iPhone 15 Pro’s 3x (77mm equivalent) telephoto?Sony is bringing a shutter angle setting to its two more affordable alpha-branded Cinema Line cameras, the FX3 and FX30, with a firmware update. Not only is the D5000 the same as, or a little quieter than the LEICA, the D5000 winds itself at the same time, while the LEICA still needs to wind film. The D5000 has inherited the D90’s groundbreaking HD movie capability, Nikon’s proprietary D-Movie function. The fact that the D5000 is at least as quiet as the Leica M7 means it probably also can replace the Leica M8.

The pop-up flash on the D5000 has several settings including Auto, Fill-in flash, Red-eye Reduction, SlowSync, Red-eye Reduction with Slow Sync, Rear-curtain Sync and Off. The one final inconvenience to the Nikon D5000's articulating LCD design is that you have to remember to fold the screen up at least partway to set the camera down on a flat surface, or risk damaging the LCD and hinge assembly. Curiously, matrix metering proved somewhat less accurate than with the D90, prompting us to use exposure compensation much more often - despite the fact that the two cameras use essentially the same metering system. Like the Nikon D40, you can change the AF point by pressing the Multi-selector on the back, which is nice, but it's too easy to do accidentally. This is a selection of sample images from the Nikon D5000 camera, which were all taken using the 12.It's not a big loss, though, because you have to edit out the T1i's focusing efforts, which often include significant changes to the exposure as well as focus when autofocusing; I'd prefer not to have to cut them out later in the editing program. Another alternative is to use the ADL bracketing feature, which alternates between no D-Lighting and Auto D-Lighting. Wide-area AF covers a broad area, and Normal-area AF features a single focus point that you can move around the screen. The D5000 in Quiet Mode is even a tiny little bit quieter than a Leica M7, which is the cloth-shuttered rangefinder camera used by modern journalists when they need a quiet camera.

but has undoubtedly meant there are many more attractive, accessible cameras on the market just waiting to entice first-time DSLR owners. The Nikon D5000's LCD screen appears to have a roughly 4:3 dimension, but the frame is built larger, to hold a wider and slightly taller screen, suggesting that we may see this same assembly on future Nikon digital SLRs, perhaps with a 3:2 screen. The articulating LCD's body is hinged at the bottom, which leaves room for the usual set of buttons down the left side of the Nikon D5000. The Canon EOS 500D, the Olympus E-620 and the Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH1 each have their own sets of strengths and weaknesses, therefore we recommend that you check out our reviews of those cameras too, before making a purchase.The biggest news in the D5000 is the use of an approximation of Helvetica instead of the 7-segment font used previously for f/stop and shutter speed readouts. The new Nikon D5000 slots in between the existing D60 and D90 models, not only in terms of feature set and functionality, but also in terms of size and weight. The invaluable Recent Settings Menu usually lets me find the item quickly so I can disable it and resume shooting. At any rate, the range of functions that can be accessed via the interactive info panel is impressive. HD movie mode is the second major feature of the Nikon D5000, capturing 1,280 x 720 resolution movies at 24 frames per second.