Nikon D7000

A week before the Photokina 2010, Nikon officially announced the D7000 on 15 September 2010 along with the lenses Nikon AF-S 200mm f/2G ED VR II, AF-S 35mm f/1.4G, and the flash SB-700 Speedlight.

The camera became available in mid-October 2010, aimed at photography enthusiasts. It was priced in the United Kingdom at £1,100 for the camera model only and £1,299 with the AF-S DX Nikkor 18-105mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR lens. In the United States, it retailed at US$1,200 for the body only and US$1,500 with the lens. In Japan, the retail price was ¥140,000 for the camera body only, ¥180,000 with the kit lens, and ¥230,000 with the Nikkor AF-S DX 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G IF-ED VR II lens.

The Nikon D7000 was succeeded by the D7100 on 21 February 2013.

• Sony IMX071 16.2 megapixel CMOS sensor, Nikon DX format with a pixel size of 4.78 μm.
• Nikon EXPEED 2 image/video processor.
• Full HD 1080p (at 24 frame/s) movie mode with auto-focus while filming, mono sound, and stereo external mic support. (30 frame/s or 25 frame/s or 24 frame/s when recording at 720p)
• Automatic correction of lateral chromatic aberration for JPEGs. Correction-data is additionally stored in RAW-files and can be used by Nikon Capture NX, View NX and some other RAW tools.
• Enhanced built-in RAW processing with extended Retouch menu for image processing without using a computer.
• Active D-Lighting and Active D-Lighting bracketing; also D-Lighting which can be applied to a JPEG using an Image Editing feature in Playback mode; Nikon Capture NX and View software include tools for applying D-Lighting to NEF format photos.
• Two user-customisable modes
• Many WB options including WB Bracketing and two auto white balance modes, one of which maintaining warm lighting colours
• 3-inch TFT LCD with 921,000-dot resolution (640×480 VGA) and 170-degree ultra-wide viewing angle with toughened glass screen
• Live View shooting mode (activated with a dedicated lever)
• Inbuilt time-lapse photography intervalometer
• Continuous Drive up to 6 frames per second for 100 JPEG frames (but not necessarily all at the same frame rate).
• Memory Buffer Capacity: Varies with image format, 10 image capacity in NEF (RAW) Lossless Compressed 14-bit format (Highest resolution available format) and can store up to 100 with JPEG.
• 2,016-pixel RGB 3D Color Matrix Metering II with Scene Recognition System.
• 3D Tracking Multi-CAM 4800DX autofocus sensor module with 39 AF points, including nine cross-type points.
• Face detection, Wide Area, Normal Area, and Subject Tracking autofocus options in live view mode.
• ISO sensitivity 100 to 6400 (up to 25600 with boost).
• Bracketing
• Dual SD memory card slots with support for SDXC cards, UHS-I bus, and Eye-Fi Wireless LAN
• Weather-resistant, sealed body that has Magnesium-alloy top and back panels.
• Built-in Sensor cleaning system
• Support for optional GPS unit direct connect.
• File formats: JPEG, NEF (Nikon's RAW, 12/14-bit also lossless compressed), MOV (H.264, PCM).
• EN-EL15 Lithium-ion Battery, Battery Life (shots per charge) approx.: 1,050 shots (CIPA).
• Lens compatibility: Nikkor F Mount, AF-S, AF-I, AF-D, Manual Nikkor AI/AIS (metering use built-in coupling on D7000)

Optional accessories

The Nikon D7000 has dozens of available accessories such as:

• Nikon WT-4A Wireless Transmitter for WLAN. Third-party solutions available.
• Nikon ML-L3 Wireless (Infrared) remote control or third-party solutions.
• Nikon GP-1 GPS Unit for direct GPS geotagging. Third-party solutions partly with 3-axis compass, data-logger, bluetooth and support for indoor use are available from Solmeta, Dawn, Easytag, Foolography, Gisteq and Phottix. See comparisons/reviews.
• Nikon MB-D11 Multi Power Battery grip or third-party solutions.
• Nikon CF-DC3 Soft Case.
• Various Nikon Speedlight or third-party flash units. Also working as commander for Nikon Creative Lighting System wireless (slave) flash.

Third-party radio (wireless) flash control triggers are partly supporting i-TTL, but do not support the Nikon Creative Lighting System (CLS). See reviews.

• Tethered shooting with Nikon Camera Control Pro 2, Adobe Lightroom 3 or other partly free products including apps.
• Other accessories from Nikon and third parties, including protective cases and bags, eyepiece adapters and correction lenses, and underwater housings.

Reviews

Since its release, the D7000 has received many favorable reviews, with some commenting that the D7000 is a viable alternative to the more expensive D300S and an upgrade over the D90. Digital Photography Review awarded the camera an overall score of 80%, praising its feature set and image quality. The D7000 received four out of five stars and the Editor's choice award in CNET's review.

DxO Labs awarded its sensor an overall score of 80, above much more expensive competitors. The main point of criticism by reviewers is the small buffer which limits the number of shots in burst mode especially when shooting RAW.

There are image comparisons with many cameras at all ISO speeds in RAW.

Awards

In 2011, the Nikon D7000 won major awards such as the Red Dot Design Award, TIPA's "Best DSLR Advanced", EISA's "European Advanced SLR Camera", and Camera Grand Prix Japan's "Reader's Award".

Matrix Metering II and detected faces

The 3D Color Matrix Metering II tends to overexpose minor parts of the image (e.g. sky or bright back-lights) if it detects faces near the image center that are darker (e.g. in shadow) than these minor parts. This feature is sometimes surprising due to reliable scene recognition and face detection (including side-view of faces) of the new high-resolution sensor, even if there are only strangers (in the dark) near the image center.

If not wanted, the metering can be changed with exposure compensation, two-point (average) metering, metering on the bright lights or use of center-weighted or spot metering, fill flash or RAW images. Increasing the dynamic range by use of Active D-Lighting or reducing the contrast settings (the default contrast is higher compared to previous Nikon DSLRs) aids when shooting JPEGs. After taking the image, contrast and brightness can easily be changed in camera.

User response

The D7000 was very much anticipated by Nikon consumers. The hype around its release made it very hard to find during the first months on the market. Supplies of this camera were also limited after the destruction of some Nikon manufacturing facilities in Thailand by the flooding in October 2011. Many users have complained about back-focus problems on the D7000, as well as dust and oil spots on early production models

Firmware hacks

Several hacks have been published by Simeon Pilgrim on Nikon Hacker internet forum and Vitaliy Kiselev on his personal website. Nikon Hacker has several people working on the hacks. The published hacks, among few others, include removing the time limit for video recording, clean HDMI and LCD on LiveView, disabling automatic hot-pixel removal (also known as Nikon Star Eater) and higher data rate for video recording. Several other hacks are under development but not yet published.

June 2013 Simeon Pilgrim was able to enable RAW video recording but the frame rate (roughly 1.5 frames per second) is not high enough to be useful. The hack is not yet published.