By wisedog on January 6, 2010 • ( Leave a comment )

Wisedog’s new toy

When I was in high school, I saw a commercial for Canon’s Rebel DSLRs. Back then I did not care which company made it, I just knew that I wanted a DSLR even if I couldn’t afford it.

Five or so years after I saw that commercial, I finally had the money to buy one but I was not sure what brand and model I would purchase. I narrowed down my choices to Canon’s Rebel XSi and Nikon’s D5000. I knew both brands were good and that a lot of figure bloggers used either brand. I pretty much couldn’t go wrong either way.

I was leaning towards Nikon since I knew even before the first digital camera was announced to the public that Nikon SLRs are the best cameras to have, it also helped that my Dad has a Nikon FM10. I did not want to be biased so I decided leave it up to chance and flip a coin (best out of 3) to see which one I should buy. The Nikon won but just to make sure it really was chance and not a subconscious part of my brain controlling my fingers to manipulate the results, I asked RPG flip a coin as well. Since Nikon won both times I decided that I am fated to buy the D5000 and put in my order at Amazon.com.

It arrived this past Monday and since then, I’ve been slowly, due to having very little time between after work and bed time, exploring each feature that it has. I haven’t given it a name yet (come to think of it, I haven’t named my FS25 yet) though I am considering one that starts with N… Nichole maybe?

One nifty feature this camera has is a swiveling LCD screen. It makes shooting at high and low angles a lot easier as well as taking self portraits (better off doing that with a point-and-shoot rather than a DSLR due to weight).

Body and Lens separated with protective caps applied.

The body is fairly big but I can wrap my hand around the right side. Pressing the directional buttons can be a bit of a strain in a shooting pose but luckily for me, I don’t have any plans to go shooting outdoors anytime soon (unless the predicted snowfall for tomorrow night/ Friday morning present itself a good subject to take).

The exterior is mainly made out of plastic and rubber but it does not feel like it thanks to the inner aluminum frame that gives the D5000 its weight and solid feel. The shell is textured to prevent the camera from slipping in your hands easily.

Though I have not fully explored the D5000, one problem that I immediately noticed was the placing of the LCD’s tilt screen. I do most of my shooting indoors and I noticed that both my tripod and gorillapad’s base were large enough to get in the way of the tilt screen preventing it from fully tilting down and rotating. This problem is not too bad, I just have to remember to remove the camera from the tripod if I want to use the tilt screen feature when using Live View.

Overall, I’m quite happy with this camera and feel that I made the right choice. I’m looking forward to taking a lot of good figure pics with it, though I really should consider buying a macro lens since the kit lens has a very limited minimum distance, 5-6 inches (I think) vs the FS25’s 2-3 inches.