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An interesting middleman
At Rs 89,950 including the kit lens, the D7000 is expensive for sure. Fortunately, it’s also a great performer, especially in low light. The focusing system while good is not up to the best in this price range, and some will prefer the larger bodies on account of their usability and heft alone. People looking for a D90 upgrade – this is it.
For Nikon fans, the D7000 has been an agonising wait. Even those looking to buy their first enthusiast grade dSLR, or even people upgrading from their D60’s and D3000’s. A few Canon users would also have been curious. And while Nikon launched the D7000 around three months back, review samples were scare, or so we had been told.
Though the dimensions are similar, the D7000 feels much better built than the D90. The rubber grip on the D7000 is a letdown – it is the same as on the D90 and still feels like too hard. While the dual SD card bay door opens with a reassuring spring action, the battery door feels limp, unlike the nice spring-loaded door on the EOS 7D. The lines on the D7000 are tight, with no gaps. The flaps are rubberized but it’s a hard sort of rubber, and would not be weather sealed. Comparatively, the flaps on the D300s are softer and seal better.
Owing to a smaller footprint, and lower profile, the grip of the D7000 is less comfortable, as the camera fits in hand, with room to spare. The D3000s has a substantial feel, and your fingers get more cameras to grip. Thumb positioning on the D7000 is also cramped. Some of the buttons on the rear of the body are smaller, and have noticeably less travel. The metering selector ring on the D300/D300s is absent, modifying this setting now involves pressing a dedicated button and using the rear dial – this is less convenient than the layout on the larger Nikon bodies. A flip switch for toggling video/still mode is a major change, highlighting the fact that the Nikon D7000 is a much more serious video recorder than any previous NikondSLR. The viewfinder on the D7000 is pretty good it’s bright, and better than the one on the D90.
The focus system consists of 39 points, out of which 9 points are cross-type. Focus points are overlaid, and not etched and have good coverage. Focusing is fast and accurate, though in low light, with no contrast in the scene, it’s not as good as the EOS 7D. On the whole, image quality is excellent. The output is punchy, without being too vivid, and colors are neutral. At ISO 100 up to 400, you are in for a treat – the output of the D7000 is pretty much in line with the EOS 7D and D3000s, and if you are looking at screen-size images, the differences are impossible to spot. More importantly, the D7000 manages to retain more detail and has a better dynamic range than the D90.
The D7000 produces better images at ISO 3200 than the D3000s does at ISO 16000, using identical settings, and of course, the same lens. This is heady stuff – for the sensor rating has grown to respectable 16.2-megapixels, from 12.1-megapixels. The D7000 gives the 7D a healthy run for its money, and we feel the D7000 is identical or a bit worse, at ISO 1600. At ISO 3200, the D7000 enjoys a marginal lead over the 7D. This lead grows at ISO 6400, but really, we’re talking about sensors that are a generation apart chronologically. If you’re talking about high ISO, low-light performance, the D7000 is probably the king among crop sensors.
Additionally, the D7000 supports really high ISO settings, and even at ISO 12,800, the image is usable with web size prints being very acceptable.