Advance testing the Nikon D90

September 3rd, 2008

I’m a Canon man but the reviews of the new Nikon D90 that I’ve seen so far are intriguing. Chase Jarvis, arguably one of the best modern day professional photographers, was given the opportunity to advance test the Nikon D90. In fact, his entire team was able to get their hands on a few of them and to test them during a project they were working on.

Photo credit: Chase Jarvis.

Here are Chase’s top five reasons that the Nikon D90 is great:

“1. The D-movie. HD720 video in an dSLR is really big news. It’s so cool that we’re seeing the merging of high quality still and video pictures into the same camera. Sure, for us pros, we’ve got the RED camera. But for everybody else? This is the future. People: this is an SLR that shoots killer video! It’s the merging of features that the pros are using and it’s made accessible the the amateur at a price point of $1200+ bucks. Trust me, I played with this feature at length…all of us on location did, for that matter. It’s going to be a powerful tool. You can control your own depth of field so beautifully using the manual focus ring, the audio capture is solid, the high ISO capabilities in video?! Way cool… Long lenses, fisheyes, zoom lenses…versatility. I’m a BIG fan of the D-Movie.

2. Photo J possibilities. This camera will be a great second body for pro photojournalists. Commercial guys like me will be loyal to the D3 and its future, but for any PJ shooter, all the bells and whistles we’ve discussed already– especially video and audio capture–make this a no-brainer as a backup body.

3. Image Quality. The sensor is really top tier for a camera targeted at advanced amateurs. The high ISO capabilities are going to be a welcome addition to cameras in this price point. Want to take images of your kid in the rain at his baseball game at 7pm? This is your camera. It’s the D300 sensor with some juice.

4. The ergonomics of this camera are great. As someone who holds a camera for a living, I think camera ergonomics are waaay underrated. This camera (light at only 1lb. 6oz) is a treat in your hand. The menus are great and everything is right where you want it.

5. Oh ya, did I mention that this thing shoots video?!”

It seems like Nikon is taking a giant leap forward in the “advance amateur” category by giving all of this away for about $1,200 and I hope that other manufacturers quickly follow suit.

Source: Chase Jarvis RAW: Advance Testing the Nikon D90.

The video at the above link is also worth watching.

8 thoughts on “Advance testing the Nikon D90”

  4. Pingback: Advance testing the Nikon D90 on The uber geeks

  5. Sameer

    I’m starting to look around for a high end digital camera, somewhere in the $1,000 to $2,000 range, so I’ll keep this in mind. I don’t know if I would really want the video feature though, being that I’d already have a camera for that. But I guess if I were somewhere taking pictures and did want video, I’d be in luck with this.

  6. Colin Devroe Post author

    Sameer: I think one of the most intriguing things about this camera, at least to me, is the video features that it has. Most DSLRs come equipped with the features that the D90 seems to have, though albeit the D90 shows several advancements there too, but being able to have that much control over the video is something you can’t even do with consumer video recorders.

  7. Sameer

    If I knew how to test a camera, I’d write a post about. What I can say is I’m enjoying the D90 so far. It has enough auto features that I can ease myself into messing around with all the advanced manual stuff.