D5600 – frederikboving

Nikon D5600: Still a good entry level camera?

Yes, the Nikon D5600 is not a modern camera. It came out in November 2016 and here in 2023 it is about 7 years old! That is a long time in this day and age, looking at the expedient development of mirrorless cameras with backlit sensors and image stabilisation and what not.

However, if you are willing to live with a camera that will not make the heads turn when you flash it in the local café, you may find that you get a camera that takes some excellent pictures and does so offering a wonderfully easy to use sets of dials and buttons. And for a price that does not break the bank.

But let’s have a look at some strongholds and some shortcomings, based upon my personal experience after owning and using this solid camera for more than a year.

Strong features

Price

Maybe the biggest advantage of the D5600 is the price: 530 EUR new with kit lens (Europe, April 2019) and 389 EUR for a camera body only version. That is less than what a battery grip costs for some mirror-less cameras! And if you further can live with a model that is a little older (the D5300) but with many of the same features as the D5600, then I have found it used on e-bay for 230 EUR and you have entered the world of photography on a budget.

A very good sensor still

It is still a very good sensor that sits in this camera, also compared to standards of today. It has 24 megapixels which is still very common for cropped sensor cameras (e.g. most of the Fujifilm x-series cameras). Despite an anti aliasing filter that it has become fashion to remove because some say it affects picture sharpness, it still produces some very great pictures with Nikon’s well known picture quality and color rendition. And you can shoot both RAW and JPG, and the JPGs are fine as well.

Ergonomics and user friendliness is top

Maybe what I enjoy the most with the D5600 is that the camera body is very light and the grip is deep. Some say the grip is not tall enough and that their pinky lacks a place to rest, but I have a very big hands and I have never had that as an issue. The camera is so light that holding it for hours has never been an issue for me. The user interface it the “good old” Nikon one, and although the D5600 lacks a front dial, the D5600 interface is very similar to other Nikon models, so if you speak Nikon, the D5600 is very easy to use. And if you don’t, you will quickly get familiar with the controls.

The LCD screen is a bonus

Maybe the LCD screen by today’s standards does not have the best resolution, but the screen is pivoting, touch sensitive, and it reacts – even compared to a modern smartphone – fairly quick.

Further, it can turn “inwards” when not used, i.e. protected from scratches and guaranteed not to bother you when using the viewfinder. This is a good thing when you shoot at night or throw the camera into an ordinary bag with other stuff – you don’t have to worry about that side of the camera!

Crop factor = “longer” lenses

The fact that the D5600 sensor is a cropped sensor (APS-C) means that the length of all lenses you attach to the D5600 are multiplied by 1.5. My 70-300mm Tamron lens suddenly becomes a 450mm at the far end which enables me take loads of pictures of birds sitting at the bird-feeder in the far end of my garden. So although some photographers claim that only full frame sensors will do, it is worth noticing that a cropped sensor also has some capabilities that full frame does not offer.

The full frame versus cropped sensor debate is one of the oldest in the photo community, and I do not want to add to the discussion, but for an entry level camera like the D5600 with 24 megapixels, I think you will find that you have plenty of resolution and picture quality for both social media and an occasional print.

Nikon glass and Nikon f-mount

The Nikon F-mount has been around since Donald duck was an egg, and there is literally thousands of lenses available for the Nikon D5600 and its f-mount. Shop around on e-bay and the local flea market, and you will be able to find some cheap vintage glass for your D5600, provided you are not afraid of manual focus. And the good thing is that if you later decide to upgrade to a higher level camera, then much of your glass can be reused. You can also find some new glass at a fair price – Nikons kit lens is a good start, and a 35mm prime lens can be achieved brand new for a reasonable price.

It is not a mirror-less

Yes it is a strange headline. But after going mirror-less also, I have come to learn to appreciate some of the features of the D5600 that I miss with the mirror-less cameras:

Battery life is awesome! As the D5600 has an optical viewfinder (and not an electronic one that needs to be powered like a tv-screen), the power consumption of the D5600 is very low, both when it sleeps and when it is switched off. I have my D5600 lying in the windowsill for weeks for an occasional bird shot without charging. That is so nice!

Sensor cleaning. On a DSLR the mirror sits between the sensor and the lens mount and that gives some protection to the sensor that I have never thought of. On a mirror-less the sensor is exposed at every lens change and that leads to dust and dirt on the sensor much faster than a DSLR. In fact, after more than a year of use, I have only cleaned the D5600 sensor once.

Shortcomings

It is a DSLR after all

Yes, a DSLR is a bit old-school and does not give you all the benefits found with a mirror-less:

There is no viewfinder with all the “heads up display” benefits. So you cannot in the viewfinder have aids like focus peek or a level meter or in general see what your picture exposure will be like before the fact.

The DSLR is noisy and it has mechanical elements. So if silent shooting is important to you, you need to look for a mirror-less camera. Many DSLRs have silent shooting modes, but you will find that they are not silent at all!

Live view is SLOOOOOW! The reason being that the camera swings the mirror away when going in live view mode (where the LSD is your viewfinder) and for each picture it swings the mirror forth and back again. That takes ages!

No 4K video

If you do a lot of video and 4K is important to you, this camera is not for you. It only does 1080p and a DSLR in my opinion is best suited for stills. If you want a great video camera, I would turn to mirror-less instead, or maybe simply use your smartphone for starters (my iPhone X offers 4K!).

No in-camera AF motor

Many of the older Nikon lenses, although it says AF for auto focus on the tin, assumes that your camera body has a built in motor to control the auto focus on the lens. The lens itself does not have a motor. Unfortunately the D3x00 and D5x00 series Nikon do not have this motor and you have to look at the D750 or the D7x00 series or higher. Or live with manual focus. Or buy only lenses that have motors built in (AF-S), but that of course rules out the vintage lenses.

The lens needs a motor in the camera body in order for auto focus to work.

If you are not sure if your camera – or the one you plan to get – has a built in AF motor, look for a little metal “ear” that sticks out bottom left on the f-mount ring when you look at the camera front. In the picture above, the bottom camera is the D7500 that has an AF motor (you can see the pen pointing at the metal “ear”), whereas the top one is the D5600 and you can see the AF motor is missing. The pen at the upper camera points to where the AF motor “ear” should have been.

No image stabilization

For years and years photographers have taken great photos without image stabilization in neither the lens nor the camera body. Now both seem to be a big wish from many, all of a sudden. So be aware that the D5600 does not have in body image stabilization (IBIS) so you either need a tripod or to buy lenses with stabilization, if you want to avoid camera shake with shutter speeds slower than 1/80th.

One SD card

People looking for a camera to be used professionally often shy away from cameras with only one SD card. I doubt that this is a concern for you if you are considering the D5600. but if coming home with pictures secured 100% on digital media, then a dual slot camera is key. The D5600 “only” as one. I underline that statistics show that it is seldom that an SD card fail, but it does happen and probably when you want it the least (that important child birthday or passing a long time dreaded exam). So if data security is high on your agenda, then a dual card solution is worth a consideration and the Nikon D7100 and D7200 deliver in this department.

Snapbridge…?

The smartphone integration (Snapbridge) could be more user friendly and many reviewers love to hate Snapbridge. I think it is better than its reputation, and you can actually remotely control your camera from the smartphone via snapbridge. But compared to say Sonys solutions for integrating your camera and smartphone, Snapbridge is cumbersome and has stability issues.

Conclusion

So, to answer the question if this is the right camera for you here in 2019, depends on your decision criteria and personal preferences: If you are a video shooter, I would seriously consider alternatives to the D5600. If a silent camera is important, I would look toward mirror-less. But if you simply want to take the step from shooting with your smartphone to a level above that, say for friends, family and an occasional landscape photo, the D5600 should be on your short list, provided you want a solution that does not break the bank. It is a very capable camera still, although the future probably is mirror-less. But some still listen to old Long Play records. And others still shoot 35 mm film based photos. Leading edge technology the D5600 is not, but it is still capable of producing great pictures worthy of social media and an occasional print. But before you make your decision, a few alternatives are worth considering.

Alternatives

I am not an expert on Canon or other brands, but I am sure that Canon and Sony and Pentax and … etc … has alternatives that compete in the same price range. The camera vendors know that if they can get you to like their camera system when you enter the market, it is likely that you will stay with that brand so you can re-use your glass. So typically they price their entry level products aggressive, in the hope they get a life-long friend in you.

If a lower pixel count is not a problem for you, and compact and portable is important, maybe your smartphone will simply do. You can get click-on lenses that fits your smartphone, and I started my photo career shooting with an olloclip lens on my iPhone 7 (the alternative is Moments). The problem with that solution is that if you upgrade your smartphone, you are likely to be in need of buying new glass or mount as well, but it is still a small investment compared to a full camera. The pictures you take can compete with an entry level camera in my opinion, and for example the iPhone X shoots 4K video, so it is actually a capable video camera! If you want the higher resolution but portability and compact is important to you, you may want to look for compact cameras such as the Sony RX100 series.

The entry-entry level camera from Nikon is the D3x00 series, and I believe the D3400 is the current model. The D3400 is available at a lower price point, but be ready to loose the pivoting screen and the touch sensitive screen as well, along with exposure bracketing and time lapses. If these features are not important to you, the D3400 could be your camera – the sensor and hence picture quality is very much the same, but check the full list of specifications to get a full overview of what the D3400 misses compared to the D5600.

Within the D5x00 series you can also go backwards on go for one of the earlier models, say the D5300. You will get very much the same camera, but a few features are different or missing on the D5300 but it is fundamentally very much the same camera.

If you are willing to spend a bit more on a camera an you want to stay with Nikon, then the D7100 and the D7200 are where you should look. These cameras are – as far as I can tell – still used by many professionals, and I have read many posts praising the pictures that these cameras produce. And then you have a camera with which you can grow as a photographer – with the D5600 you may find that you quickly grow out of it if you are bid by the photography bug.

Finally, if you want to go mirrorless, the Z50 is a very attractive alternative to the entry level DSLRs from Nikon. It is a APS-C mirrorless camera with the new lens mount that Nikon developed for the Z-series. If you do not have a lot of vintage or F-mount glass you want to re-use, then the Z50 as an entry level alternative should definitely be on your short list.

Video link

Nikon D750: Why I chose the D750 for photography

Introduction

In this post I will be looking at Nikon’s enthusiast DSLR camera line up to explain why I ended up buying the D750 after owning the D5600 for a year or so. I look at digital cameras here – film is another story!

If you want to get to know the Nikon camera lineup, this wiki page gives a good overview, both in terms of available models and which were released when.

This post is intended to give you inspiration if you are to buy a Nikon camera. Your decision criteria and personal preferences are probably different from mine. So most likely you will end up making a different decision than me, or arrive at the same decision but for different reasons. So please read this post in that context.

Nikon D5600 and D3400

The 3×00 series is the entry level model whereas the 5×00 is considered a notch above that but still in the entry level end of the Nikon scale. I have no experience with the D3x00 but I would imagine it is a budget friendly (scaled down) version of the D5x00 with very much the same look and feel. My D5600 is solid workhorse that has served me well and I only sold it because I moved to full frame.

The reason why I moved away from the 3×00/5×00 series is the lack of a in-body auto focus (AF) motor. Nikon (and Sony) have been around for ages, and their legacy gives access to a wide range of vintage glass that can be bought for a fraction of the prices of new glass. However, many of these lenses either have manual focus or focus via a screwdriver setup, where a small motor driven pin in the camera body as shown here:

It drives the focus mechanism in the lens. I absolutely love the low prices and high quality of vintage Nikkor glass in combination with the comfort of auto focus – the D3x00/D5x00 series were no longer an option for me.

Nikon D7500

The need for an in-body AF motor literally drove me to the 7×00 series. These APS-C sensor cameras have many fans, and especially when reading blog comments from D7100 and D7200 owners, these cameras apparently serve their owners very well. And both used and new, these cameras are close to unbeatable when it comes to the price/performance ratio – a steal.

Despite these two strong candidates, I went for the D7500 – the camera that the internet loves to hate, as Steve Perry says in his review of the camera. I absolutely loved it – super fast frames per second, stunning low light performance, tilt screen, nice LCD and a deep grip. I felt I got a scaled down version of the D500 for a bargain.

I would probably have owned and used the D7500 today had it not been for an unfortunate accident where I dipped the camera in salt water to save myself from falling. That taught me always wear a camera strap when out and about, but it also meant that my D7500 was ruined in a cannot-be-saved way (salt water simply eats the thin metal in the electronics inside the camera). So I went back to my D5600 for a while, saving money and contemplating my next move.

Cropped versus full-frame

In the photo community on social media the debate regarding full frame versus cropped sensors (APS-C) is probably one of the oldest around. And it goes on and on. I think that over the years the APS-C sensors have moved closer and closer to the full frame sensors in terms of performance, and many will claim that the differences are small if visible at all. I have no ambition to add to this discussion.

I can see that many – also professional – wildlife photographers prefer the APS-C sensor due to the crop factor. So it is a matter of horses for courses – you cannot say that full frame is this A-team and APS-C is the B-team. It is more complicated than that. A Nikon D500 (APS-C) is by many considered more professional grade than the full frame Nikon D610.

So all this just to say that I eventually went for a full frame model simply because I was curious! I wanted to experience what a full frame camera could do when compared to an APS-C. Is it rational and clear thinking to go for full frame just because you are curious? No, absolutely not. But it is my honest answer, and the reason why you should consult your own personal preferences when making a purchase decision. You can read more here about the arguments for shifting from APS-C to full frame.

The Nikon D750

After deciding to go for a full frame Nikon DSLR camera body, it was really down to 4 different models: the D610, D750, D810 and D850. And before I started to look at reviews, I started with the specs and prices – budget is important to me. In February 2019, this is what a simple table of comparison looked like:

The models are across, starting with the D610 and ending with the D850. In the bottom the last 3 lines gives the prices in Euro, the increase going from one model to the next and finally the index comparing towards the D610. So for example, the D850 is 3 times as expensive as the D610, and you will have to raise your budget by 26% if you decide to go for the D810 over the D750.

Let me start with the easy part: the D850. This one is undoubtedly the DSLR of my dreams, but also way out of my league budget wise. It has an impressive 45 mp sensor and an Expeed 5 processor, so I have every reason to believe that this is as good as it gets. But but, budget budget.

In the other end of the scale is the D610 which is much closer to my budget and what I intend to spend. However, having seen what the modern Expeed processor did in the D7500 camera, I wanted to go for the most modern Expeed processor possible, and here the D750 had an advantage (as marked in the lower red circle). Also, as I often shoot low light, the ISO performance of the D750 also seemed very attractive (top red circle). Of course you should buy as cheap as possible, but on the other hand it is silly spending 800 EUR on a camera body and then missing the features of a 300 EUR more expensive body – then I think it is better to save for a little longer and then go for the better model.

So the final choice was between the D750 and the D810. After going in circles for weeks, I finally decided that I could not defend the need for a 36 mp sensor – it is way more than what I need. Most of my pictures are for social media and the like and are condensed/reduced in resolution to a level where 24 mp is more than sufficient.

With this in the back of my head, I started to study reviews of the Nikon D750, and especially two videos caught my attention. The first one is a professional wedding photographer (“this one will shoot in the dark”). The second one is a video from Seattle Museum of flight. Of course I read many more reviews of the D750 like the one from Techradar.

And piling all this together, I found the choice of the D750 an easy one. So I ended up buying the D750, and I am a happy camper!

Afterthought

Here in 2023, I still have my Nikon D750. I also have a Nikon D4, a Nikon Z6ii and a Nikon D700. But I hold on to the D750. It is just a workhorse that does exactly what you ask it to.

It is still my preferred camera for a product shoot, simply because it is so easy to work with. I once read in a review of the car BMW 320 that the reviewer liked the care more and more, the more he drove in it, and that one of the reasons was that every dial and button sat exactly where he wanted them to. There was no strange design features or experimentations going on here – every button and dial was functional and tested in detail. My feeling about the D750 is exactly the same: it is a workhorse that does what you tell it to. The shooting experience is great!

The D750 does not have the heavy sound or feel of say a professional grade Nikon D4, in fact, some will say it feels a little too light and made of too much plastic. That may well be, but if you judge the camera on it’s usability, features and output, I think you will find that it is an all round DSLR that is hard to beat. Add to that the massive lineup of used / vintage f-mount glass that can be mounted on the D750 and you have a very capable package that is hard to beat when it comes to price / performance.

I have several Z-mount lenses and a Nikon Z6ii. The Z-mount glass is better than the F-mount, I think that is evident when you read reviews and see it for yourself. The question is if you need the better technical performance from the Z-mount glass? It is a pleasure to work with the Z-mount glass, but to be honest, I think most photographers really don’t need the additional performance.

You could of course go for the Nikon Z6ii, which is the mirrorless competitor to the Nikon D750, and then mount F-mount glass on the Z6ii using a FTZ adapter. But than all your AF glass with mechanical autofocus would be manual focus, as the Z6ii has no focus motor!

The benefit of a mirrorless camera is eg. a silent camera with no mirror flicking and the focus peaking highlights (my full list of mirrorless advantages is here). And if this is important to you, the Z6ii may be an alternative to consider. But again, if you look at the price / performance, I think you will find that the D750 is an option that is hard to beat. The mirrorless features comes at a high price.

My only reservation is this: If you want a hybrid camera, the video capabilities of the Nikon D750 shows the age of the camera (no 4K). But for photography it is still a very capable camera.

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Tag: D5600