The Nikon D60 is a great little camera that is capable of taking excellent photographs. Having just spent a couple of months in India with it as well as having thousands of shots under my belt with it and its predecessor the Nikon D40, I feel qualified to judge its capabilities.
The Nikon D60 is no longer available new, having been replaced by the Nikon D5000 and the Nikon D3000. I think the real replacement is the Nikon D5000 (the D3000 lacks some features) so here is my affiliate link to the Nikon D5000 at B&H.
Diverting just for a moment, the D5000 has live-view and a lot of people like it. I couldn’t care two hoots about it and it just doesn’t suit my style of photography. I guess I am ingrained with the idea of sticking my eye to a little viewfinder and looking at the world that way.
The D60 is not my only camera. I also shoot a Nikon D700, and before that I shot with a Nikon D200. Before that I shot with a Nikon D70, so I have a lot of experience with these cameras and I have the high-end, full frame Nikon D700 against which to compare the D60. That’s why I feel justified in saying the D60 is a great little camera.
The Nikon D60 is very well built. I think it is important to state that right at the outset because, of course, reliability is important. I bought it with the kit lens and that is the second thing to say, which is that I dislike lenses that seem fragile, so I didn’t like the 18-55mm kit lens that came with the camera. The lens was practically given away with the body, so I didn’t refuse it – I just sold it on.
The kit lens may not actually be fragile, but I don’t like lenses where the inner barrel waggles about as you zoom. So it had to go. Perhaps I gave it short shrift and if anyone has any experience with the lens that shows how rugged it is, I would be happy to hear it. Just leave a comment below.
On the other hand, I like the Nikon 35mm AF-S f1.8 lens, (which is equivalent to a focal length of 52.5mm in full-frame) but I would really like a lens with a similar size and weight that is a little wider – around 40mm full-frame equivalent. There just isn’t such a lens, however. At least, not one that Nikon makes.
Here is my affiliate link to the Nikon 35mm AF-S lens at B&H
OK, that was about lenses. Now for the camera. As I said, it is light and well-built. It focuses very quickly (more or less instantaneously) with the 35mm lens but does less well with the Nikon 60mm AF-S macro. That is more a feature of the 60mm lens, but the lack of a drive motor in the camera body cannot help.
Once you get to know the camera, it is very quick in use. Just set the function button to change ISO and then you don’t need to dig into the the menus.
I shoot Aperture Priority almost all the time, so changing ISO and exposure compensation (easy to do with the rear wheel and the top button) are the things I change most often after the aperture setting itself. Using the set-up I just described makes using the camera as easy as you could want. Well not as easy as on the D700 for example, where everything is in the viewfinder and you can do it all with the camera to your eye.
The dynamic range is not as wide as for the D700, and it clips highlights in a way the D700 does not. But it weighs half of the what the big camera does.
I don’t like the fact that I cannot set the focus point and then lock it. There are only three focus points (there are 11 on the D5000 and lots more on the D700), but there is no way to lock the central position, which is the focus position I prefer. It used to be more of a problem and kept changing on me, but I seem to have got the hang of avoiding hitting the button now.
It shoots cleanly enough up to ISO 400 and I have no hesitation in shooting at ISO 800 when I need to. The familiar grittiness starts to show, but it won’t ruin your photographs.
So, that’s about it. It is a light-tight box and very efficient. If you were thinking of getting a compact camera that has a big sensor, or plumping for a small sensor compact camera to save weight and bulk, then I would just caution you with one word: speed. The D60 does everything fast. It focuses fast and it writes to the card fast.
Get it if you want to shoot without waiting for the camera to do its thing. Like I said, the Nikon D60 is fast.
