Nikon D7500 DX-format Digital SLR Portrait and Prime Lens Kit

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Before I start, these are simply my own impressions. I was once a professional photographer way back in the days of film and photographed over 600 weddings, as well as sports teams and schools. Nowadays I am just an amateur who sells prints once in awhile. I am also a recently retired economics teacher and in my quest to upgrade from my excellent, but outdated D7000, I applied the principles of wants vs needs, trade-offs, opportunity costs, and cost benefits. Realizing the no camera will give one exactly what they want, I narrowed the requirements down. My two main criteria were higher ISO performance and more accurate focus. I do a lot of bird in flight, and both are essential. It came down to the D7200, the D7500, and the D500. The D7200 already being two years out, I ruled it out. The D500 fit my needs, and a few wants, but the price tag was a bit steep. The D7500 seemed the best fit, and after trying it for a couple of days I believe I made the right choice. ISO- While the D7000 had an upper limit of ISO 1600 before degrading, I now feel quite comfortable at 3200 which helps with the 180 f/2.8 for birds. I will test at higher when I do some Milky Way shots next week. Focus- Spot on, fast and accurate. I can track a bird quite easily. Exposure- Amazing. The color rendition and exposure are so good I don’t have to do any tweaking. Even shooting a bird against a bright blue sky the metering handle it. Eight frames per second is fast. The shutter is quite sensitive and I will easily shoot a sequence when only one is needed, but they delete. The shutter is much quite quieter than the D7000 and makes a sweet sound like my old Contax. The negatives that people are sounding off on don’t bother me. One card slot is okay, I never utilized the second slot before, and I am not doing anything that a card failure would cause a catastrophic loss. No battery grip is okay too. I have one for the older camera, but never used it. I am so old that reaching over with my finger feels natural. Not being able to meter with old lenses is okay too, I don’t have any. The bottom line is that this camera meets my needs, and then some, giving me a good return on investment. Update 7/17- After spending a couple of weeks with the camera I am even more pleased. I found the group autofocus and af-c to work the best for tracking birds. I have gone up to ISO 6400 with satisfactory results, in fact I have yet to use the flash. Update 7/21- I have been using the camera at the beach for surfer photos and it performs impeccably. Battery life is a bit short, but that may be affected by the use of a screw drive lens. The sunrise photo was shot with the 10.5 fisheye.

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A change in direction for Nikon... My D7500 body arrived on June 5th, shipped directly from Nikon USA, not from Amazon. So thats why this is not a "Verified Purchase" review. I have to say, Im pleasantly surprised with this camera. Its not all roses though, and I certainly have my gripes. And its a pretty big letdown if you intend to use it with big/heavy lenses handheld. If youre moving from a D3xxx or D5xxx body to the D7500, its a pure upgrade and youll have no regrets. A "no-brainer," if you will. However, I do suggest that you give serious consideration to the D7200 (for several hundred dollars less) before you commit to the D7500 as the D7500 is not a clear upgrade from the D7200. The D7500 is a give-and-take vs. the D7200 and which of those cameras is right for you will really depend on your style and needs. Definitely not a black and white decision. If you wont shoot a lens larger than the 70-300mm F4.5-5.6G VR handheld and wont do much vertical shooting, Id go with the D7500. But with a lens bigger/heavier than the 70-300mm handheld and/or you will do a lot of vertical shooting, the D7200 is the easy call, as youll need a battery grip and the D7200 offers one while the D7500 does not. To understand where Im coming from, I got this camera as a replacement for my D7200. D7500 vs. my D5300 is an easy call for the D7500. But I dont call the D7500 an upgrade over my D7200 because in several important ways, the D7500 is actually a downgrade from the D7200. I almost didnt even order it. The ONLY reason I was getting the D7500 was for the 50-frame 14-bit RAW buffer and the 8fps Continuous Shooting speed at that resolution. I didnt want the D7500s sensor because 24MP is my favorite sensor size and I didnt want to go with the D7500s 20MP. I didnt want the tilting screen because with the many Nikon DSLRs Ive had, every single one of them had Live View AF that was totally worthless so I never used Live View, so a tilting screen wouldnt matter. I didnt care about the touchscreen either. I didnt care about the 4K video because without usable Live View AF, video resolution doesnt matter since youre never gonna shoot video. Well, what actual use taught me about my expectations was: 1) While I dont forgive it for being only 20MP, this sensor is quite impressive. I love my D7200s sensor and the D7500 hardly distances itself from the D7200, but it does have detectably better color and saturation and very slightly better ISO performance. EDIT June 18, 2017: A suggestion is to set High ISO NR (Noise Reduction) to either Off or Low for JPEGs. The Normal and High settings completely eliminate color noise but are rather aggressive with their smoothing and detail is lost, and the images start looking digital at Normal and really look digital at High. The Off setting gives a natural appearance but with some color noise (closest to core RAW data). The Low setting still looks quite natural and with very little color noise. Ive used Low and Off NR for awhile now, over wide varying conditions, and have decided to stick with the Off setting. I just dont like the aggressiveness and particular smoothing character of the D7500s NR. And since noise is relatively low on the D7500, Ive decided that a little grain is fine and the more natural, finer, microcontrast obtained without NR is preferable for my style of shooting and image character taste. Afterall, I do come from decades of shooting film. Perhaps if you spend a lot of time at/above ISO 3200 you may want to go with Low NR. I believe a lot of the praise this (and the D500s) sensor is getting from the public for high ISO performance is actually due to the specific character of noise reduction of the EXPEED 5 image processor (not the sensor) which completely eliminates color noise at the Normal and High settings for JPEGs and embedded JPEGs in RAW images. Its really rare to not see ANY color noise in photographs at medium and moderately high ISOs, and everybodys used to noise smoothing. Core RAW data between the D7200 and D7500 are nearly identical. The D7500 has more accurate/neutral color noise though, as the D7200s noise pulled a little magenta. 2) This is a BIG one. Live View AF actually works! Dont get me wrong, Live View AF is not even in the same ballpark as Viewfinder AF for speed of consistent lock-on. However, this IS a big improvement because it is the first Nikon DSLR Ive owned (maybe the D500 is on par with the D7500 here?) that has usable Live View AF and therefore is the first Nikon DSLR Im actually shooting video with. 3) Now that Live View AF works, the tilting screen actually has value. And it, for the first time, GENUINELY allows camera-away-from-eye shooting. Now I can pretty reliably shoot video, and stills(!), from weird angles provided there is a decent amount of light. Opened a lot of doors here... 4) Regular AF performance is somewhat improved at the AF points away from center. The D7500 has the same AF system as the D7200, but the D7500 has the greatly-improved metering system of the D500. A lot of pre-release hype was made of how this meter will improve AF. Sounded like typical marketing hype that amounts to nothing to me. But, whether its the meter or something else in the camera, AF performance has improved. 5) A new feature also thanks to the D500s meter is Viewfinder AF face-tracking. Meaning that while you look through the regular viewfinder (not Live View) the camera will find face(s), and track a face if using AF-S Auto, AF-C Auto, or AF-A Auto. It actually works fairly well. It could use some refinement and it rarely locks onto eyes, but it is a pretty reliable feature and really handy. It seems like youre supposed to go to Custom Settings Menu / b4 Matrix Metering / Face Detection On to activate this feature. And it seems implied that youre supposed to be using Matrix Metering for the feature to work. What Ive found in actual use is that it doesnt seem to matter if you turn this feature on or off and it also doesnt seem to matter what metering mode youre in. If you set your focus mode to AF-S Auto, AF-C Auto, or AF-A Auto, it will always look for faces. For the record though, AF-C 3D and AF-A 3D still tracks action better. But really because you tell it exactly what to focus on each time. The D7500s face-recognition isnt ready for demanding use yet. Its convenient for group shots/snapshots, but not for serious portraiture, and certainly not for sports. *Might* be awesome for BIF (Birds In Flight) or other subjects that have a low-contrast/no-contrast background, but I havent tried that yet so I can only speculate. 6) Mounted on a tripod with focus fixed (recording a landscape), I have to say the 4K 30p looks really good. There is a substantial 1.5x crop factor to shoot 4K so youll need a really wide lens. Compression isnt aggressive and fine distant detail was maintained. I did notice quite a bit of wind noise in moderate wind even with the wind noise filter activated. Im not experienced at shooting video so I couldnt tell you if the ergonomics or other characteristics of the D7500 as a video camera are good or bad relative to other video DSLRs. However, the 4K 30p video image quality is very solid! I imagine 4K timelapse with the D7500 could be tremendously impressive! 7) With such solid ergonomics and a really intuitive root Menu structure, I didnt care about the touchscreen. It just wasnt necessary. BUT, for pinch-zooming and repositioning while reviewing photos, its fantastic! However, and this is a giant head-scratcher, for in-camera cropping (Nikon calls this "Trim"), pinch-zoom does not work. Whaaat in the wooorlllddd??? But you can move the crop frame around the screen by finger-dragging it. 8) In-camera RAW processing now has a setting for most options that retains the as-shot setting. So now when you in-camera RAW process and all you want to do is add +1.0 Exposure Compensation, for example, assuming youve selected the As-Shot setting for all the options, all you do is add +1.0 and then hit EXE and youre done. No need to confirm White Balance, Picture Control, Active D-Lighting are how you shot them. On that note, you dont have to remember what Picture Control, etc. you actually shot that photo at. 9) At first I cringed that there would no longer be magnesium body parts in the D7xxx line as it is one of the defining features of the D7xxx line. But, given how much I like the light weight of my D3300 and D5300, I actually consider this a benefit. For me. I dont beat on my gear so I dont need that level of durability. Not to belittle magnesium durability as some people will really need it. But thats truly not many people at all. I doubt even 1% of D7xxx users NEED that kind of durability. So long as this does not affect AF or sensor alignment, Im good. 10) This is a personal choice thing and not everyone will agree here, but I like that there are no "dangly triangles" neckstrap guides anymore. I really dont use straps and hated those triangles dangling all the time. I know they are removable, but then you lose them or dont have them when you actually need a strap. The "fixed slot" of the D7500 is better for me but I wish they were positioned differently and faced upwards instead of jutting out to the side. 11) The shutter is quieter now. It sounds more refined and is noticeably less intrusive. Nice. 12) EDIT June 16, 2017: The new (if youre coming from a D7200) Highlight-weighted Metering (the mode after Matrix and before Spot with an icon that looks like Spot Metering with an asterisk (*) at the top right corner) is coming in very handy for me since with bright scenes I nearly always will expose for the highlights and lift shadows in post. For scenes that dont have excessive "hot spot(s)," this mode yields unpredictable results, for me anyway. I suggest NOT using it unless there is highlight detail that needs to be preserved. Matrix Metering upon its creation decades ago was designed to give a bias towards preserving highlight detail and it is an improvement over Center-weighted Metering in that respect unless the highlight is in the center of the frame. Highlight-weighted metering is basically an automatic spot meter that actively looks for and finds highlights and then exposes for them, with little or no concern for the rest of the scene. Just as manually spot metering will do, Highlight-weighted will let the rest of your scene go really dark in order to prevent blown highlights. Combining a healthy dose of ADL and/or Exposure Compensation may be in order, but of course, this is up to your own taste and the scene itself. And since Lightroom cant process D7500 RAW images yet, right now youre limited to Nikon software or in-camera post-processing in 2-stops of brightening and/or ADL. Highlight-weighted Metering really works better when it is the subject that is highlighted, rather than something like a bright sky behind your subject. When your subject is backlit and youre using Highlight-weighted Metering, I suggest adding ("overexposing") 1 or 2 stops of Exposure Compensation. Examples in my attached Photos 9, 10, 11. 13) So, regarding THE reason I bought the camera; 8fps and 50-frame RAW buffer! Well, yeah, its what youd expect: BADASS! For all but special applications or the most demanding professional work, this is more than enough performance. And I finally get to say that about Nikons Continuous frame rate and buffer! Being limited to real-life 5 or 6fps for 2 or 2.5 seconds (and even that was only recently) was really frustrating. The D7500 finally has a usable Continuous High frame rate and adequate buffer. And all was good in the world... :) So, as mentioned earlier, its not all roses: 1) Now there is only 1 memory card slot. 2 memory card slots was one of the defining features of the D7xxx series. So, I dont really consider this a D7xxx series camera anymore. To me, its a D6000. Different people will value the "Backup Slot" differently. To me, its important. Not critical, but certainly important. I have had cards fail on me and was saved by the Backup Slot. But thats only happened a couple times over more than a decade. The problem is, you dont get to pick when your card fails. Maybe you lose rubbish photos of your cat and its no loss. Maybe you lose your best friends wedding pictures or your priceless travel photos on an African photo safari! :O This leap backwards is a justifiable reason for many to avoid this camera and Nikon better not make this blatant "dont-cannibalize-D500-sales" marketing call in the D7500s successor. 2) No vertical grip ability. Again, another defining feature of the D7xxx line is gone. Different people will value this differently. It matters to me. Im pretty upset about this. *Maybe* it would be okay if this was called the D6000 and was priced at $899. But its not okay as a D7xxx at $1,250. EDIT June 18, 2017: Last night I finally got to shoot action with this 8fps machine. I shot an outdoor concert with the AF-S 80-400mm F4.5-5.6G mounted. Frankly, it was very disappointing and difficult. This is a larger/heavier lens, which is what you expect to be shooting with when shooting action thats not right in front of you. The D7500 is too small and doesnt have enough leverage to easily manipulate such a rig. Vertical shooting was horrible. Without a tripod or monopod, this setup and larger (and even a little smaller as well) is just simply too clumsy. Shooting this setup without a vertical grip was far too burdensome last night and the lack of stability due to poor camera bracing posture caused at least 1-stop of blur, and therefore I had to go with at least 1-stop higher for ISO. Throwing away 1 or 2 stops of ISO in the evening/night just made the D7200 FAR superior and comfortable vs. the D7500 for handheld shooting action with bigger lenses in darker settings. Very ironic as thats EXACTLY what the D7500 was touted at excelling at. In intimate settings with smaller/lighter F1.4, F1.8, or F2.8 lenses (20mm, 24mm, 28mm, 35mm, 50mm, 58mm, 85mm, 105mm), sure, the D7500 is better for horizontal shooting, but still not for vertical shooting. If youre going to shoot concerts/shows in low light handheld with a 70-200mm F2.8 or 80-400mm F4.5-5.6 or 200-500mm F5.6 or similar (and forget about using a 200mm F2.0 or 300mm F2.8 handheld!), dont use the D7500 to shoot it until a vertical grip becomes available. Some company is going to have to develop a vertical battery grip that uses ML-L3 infrared signal to trigger the D7500. At least I REALLY hope so... 3) The touted deeper grip, to me, is actually a negative. To achieve the less-bunched-up holding position, the front of the grip was not extended outward from the body, but rather, the body was narrowed so that your fingertips wrap around the front of the grip at the same length, but go deeper into the body so that your fingertips are no longer being pushed back (or not AS pushed back) by the camera body. The problem with this is that when your ring finger reaches for Fn2 (the bottom Function button), your finger is always scraping against the inside of the lens mount area. I had to switch to using my pinkie finger for Fn2. This new method is going to have to overwrite long-burned muscle memory and I dont know if Ill ever prefer this. Secondly, the position of Fn1 is poor. Its too tall of a button now and your middle finger will very often accidentally activate Fn1. Effort must be made to stay away from Fn1. Thirdly, the grip rubber seems to be a harder less-grippy rubber than the D7200s. Ive cleaned and rubbed this rubber to get any wax or initial "stuff" off of it, but it just feels different from the D7200 and I REALLY dont like it! Hopefully it will break in. EDIT June 12, 2017: After almost dropping my D7500 while picking it up from a table due to the slippery rubber grip a couple days ago, I "scrubbed" all the grippy rubber on the camera vigorously for several minutes with a rubbing alcohol-soaked cotton make-up remover pad this morning. This helped a lot. (MAKE SURE THAT THE FIRST THING YOU DO WHEN YOU RECEIVE YOUR D7500 IS TO SCRUB ALL THE RUBBER ON THE CAMERA WITH ALCOHOL! DO THAT BEFORE EVEN INSTALLING THE BATTERY!) This morning the grip was kind of gummy and left a residue on my hand. Even after the alcohol-scrubbing, its still kind of gummy. But its much more grippy now. Still not how it should be, but its now outside of the "red zone" for inadvertent drops. The right thumb grip on the right back of the camera is nice and grippy so make sure your thumb is planted and you should be okay. EDIT June 16, 2017: Im finding that I constantly have to "scrub down" the rubber as it keeps regaining its "slippery gumminess." Frustrating. EDIT July 08, 2017: This rubber just doesnt break in. It simply is slippery and definitely a substantial liability. Another D7500 irony; much-touted grip... that fails on materials cheapness... This is absolutely inexcusable on a $1,246.95 camera body. Nikon should do a recall, and repair free of charge any D7500s and attached lenses, flashes, etc. damaged from drops. 4) The frame crop for 4K is ridiculous! 1080p video doesnt suffer this crop so this really seems to be an intended crippling of the D7500 so as to not cannibalize the Full-Frame bodies that shoot 4K. 5) This is really a gripe Ive had since the D7200. The Info Display is crap compared to how it was on the D7100. Same goes for the top LCD display thats even smaller than the D7200s, which is inferior to the D7100s. Further, and this is my main gripe about this, is that the "i Menu" since the D7200 incarnation does not highlight items on the Info Display for you to then change. I liked navigating the intuitive double lower rows for common functions. Now the i Menu takes you to a regular Menu list that you scroll up and down like any other root Menu. The whole top LCD/Info Display/i Menu system is a really big step backwards from the D7100. Actually, the D7000 was even better because you could press Info once for the Info Display and then press Info the second time to pick items to change right there on that screen so you didnt even need an i Menu. Why Nikon departed this totally intuitive and efficient system is mind-boggling. 6) When is Nikon going to get rid of the stupid Mode knob lock button??? I never ever EVER accidentally changed Modes on my cameras that dont have Mode lock buttons. Not having such control locks ever was a problem. But always having to get around these locks is a constant block to seamless shooting and a pain in the butt. 7) This isnt Nikons fault, but Adobe Lightroom doesnt support D7500 RAW yet. Its a good thing the in-camera RAW processing is so efficient... EDIT July 25, 2017: FINALLY, after more than 7 weeks after the D7500s release, Lightroom can work with D7500 RAW files!!! In summary, this camera is a bunch of steps forward and a bunch of steps backward vs. the D7200. It is ALL-forward if youre coming from a D3xxx or D5xxx body though. And it is in FACT no longer a D7xxx series camera. Its just not. Its really the D6000. So far Im really liking the responsiveness and refined feel and the confidence of knowing I have a tool that can very competently capture action with small lenses. Im quite fond of my "D6000" but I think its very overpriced. Without the security of the Backup Card Slot and no vertical grip, particularly since the new grip is literally dangerously slippery, this camera shouldnt be getting D7xxx pricing. For $899.00, it would be a great-but-compromised camera and a solid deal. But since it costs $1,246.95, you decide if what Ive talked about is worth it to you... BUGS NOTICED SO FAR: 1) June 10, 2017: Buffer Reserve remaining frames improperly displays as "r12" in the viewfinder and in Live View when the buffer is totally empty (ready for a full burst). As you shoot continuously, the Reserve counter erratically counts down from 12, but occasionally jumps back up a frame. For example, you start shooting with the counter at 12, a few frames later you drop to 11, 2 frames later you drop to 10, on the next frame the counter goes to 11, then to 10 on the next frame, etc. I expect Nikon will address this in the first firmware update since this is happening on a camera whose primary draw is fast continuous shooting. For continuous shooting, it is a really in-your-face flaw. 2) June 21, 2017: Ive noticed this a couple times in the past and hoped it would just go away. But it happened again last night. Sometimes the D7500 just freezes up and becomes unresponsive to any button presses or dial turns. Last night I waited through such a freeze and after about a minute, things seemed to return to normal. Previously Id turn the camera off once the freeze happened and then back on again and everything was okay. This kind of error makes me very paranoid about data corruption and I panic about losing the data on the sole memory card. Who knows, perhaps even with 2 cards if there was a corruption it would corrupt both cards, I dunno. But Id sure like the chance that a backup card could save the day, but the D7500 has no backup card... 3) June 11, 2017: Im finally calling this a bug, as it serves no purpose and is really inconvenient. The new Viewfinder face recognition feature is cool. However, once you set any AF Mode (AF-S, AF-C, AF-A) to Auto (this is the only AF Mode you get Viewfinder face recognition in), the other AF Modes all switch to Auto as well. This may be a trait of other Nikons as well, I dont know, but its a real pain. Ive never used AF Auto before because its never picked my subject accurately. It was a garbage Mode that had no place in a DSLR. Ive always used the Single Point setting for Single Focus Mode (AF-S Single), and 3D tracking for Continuous Focus modes (AF-C 3D and AF-A 3D). The camera remembered these settings. On the D7500, choosing the Auto setting for any of the Modes sets AF-S, AF-C, and AF-A all to Auto. You cant have AF-S Single and AF-C Auto/AF-A Auto. So everytime you set AF-C Auto for face-recognition for action, when you go back to AF-S, you must manually re-set to Single. This is clumsy and costs critical time, which results in lost photos. PHOTOS IN THIS REVIEW (Amazon has issues displaying my images so if you dont see them all, thats why...): 1) This is an example of Live View AF. It is an uncropped JPEG created in-camera via RAW processing the original. The only thing done to it was converting it to JPEG. ISO 220, 1/125sec., F2.2, 35mm F1.8G DX Nikkor. 2) This is a straight crop from Photo #1. 3) Example of 10mm lens (current widest non-fisheye Nikkor lens) still image uncropped frame, for following video crop comparison. 4) 10mm frame from 1080p video. Only the top and bottom were cropped from the full 3:2 still image frame by the camera due to the 16:9 aspect ratio. 1080p video gets full sensor width. Approximation of 4K frame crop border shown in red. 5) 10mm frame from 4K video. Actual frame, no cropping by me. Nikon causes a 1.5x crop going from 1080p to 4K. 6) 18mm uncropped still image. For very many DX shooters, this will be the widest focal length in their lens lineup. 7) 18mm frame from 1080p video. Only the top and bottom were cropped from the full 3:2 still image frame by the camera due to the 16:9 aspect ratio. 1080p video gets full sensor width. Approximation of 4K frame crop border shown in red. 8) 18mm frame from 4K video. Actual frame, no cropping by me. Nikon causes a 1.5x crop going from 1080p to 4K. 9) Regarding Highlight-weighted Metering comments above. Settings for this photo: Highlight-weighted Metering, ISO 100, 1/125sec., F3.0, ADL Normal, Landscape Picture Control. No edits. 10) This is Photo #9 above, but in-camera RAW-processed with +2.0 Exposure Compensation (brightening), ADL H2. This is the best it can get in-camera. With Lightroom, it could be a LOT better. Preservable highlights and enough dynamic range to lift shadows substantially. 11) Matrix Metering, ISO 1600, 1/80sec., F3.0, ADL Normal, Landscape Picture Control. No edits. Highlights are totally lost.

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Just a short review, more of a user experience. I bought the D7500 for a month long trip to Europe. I was replacing a D7100 that had some nagging problems that often left me less than satisfied (It had been dropped - and repaired - early in its life, but was never as good as I expected). Anyway, I filled 4-5 64 Gig memory cards on the trip, and I have to say that this camera is far better than my old one. The low light abilities are awesome, and on the few instances where I needed to take a picture hand held in low light with some depth of field, ISO 16000 was a very viable option. Not noise free, but better than ISO 6400 on the older camera. Other features that made the user experience better: I could easily transfer pictures to my phone - very important to my wife and convenient for sharing or posting to Facebook when traveling without a computer. The connection to the phone also meant that I could share the phones GPS with the camera and therefore get location tags on every photo. This worked very well, though it is possible that it negatively affects the phones battery - but my phone is old and it is hard to really tell. (I think the automatic download was more detrimental to the phone battery, and it took a little searching to figure out how to turn off automatic downloads for every photo). As for the camera battery, it was also good, though again, the automatic download seemed to affect it a lot, as did a lot of activity on the display. The tilting screen was useful to have, but not as useful as a fully articulating screen (like the D5300). The touch screen was awesome, and made it VERY easy to check critical focus and work with the menu - even with gloves on. I was in a cold weather environment, so I had gloves on much of the time. These gloves had something on each finger that would let it work with an iPhone, and therefore it worked just as well with he camera. I liked the feature where you could use the live preview and touch the screen where you wanted it to be in focus, and it would refocus and take the shot. I understand why people complain about the missing second SD slot, but as long as I carried a second card around, it was fine. I never made automatic backups anyway, and I can live without putting RAW on one card and JPG on the other. It would have been nice, but the other features are more important to me. The depth of field preview seems to be gone, and that is disappointing, but it is usually easy enough to take a shot and check depth of field and then take another. The exposure settings were a little more confusing to me, and I could not reliably determine if the camera tended to over or underexpose. I think I ended up using plus or minus 1/3 of a stop a lot of the time, and sometimes a lot more than that. Overall, I am very happy with the purchase. I might change my mind after reviewing the thousands of photos I took on the trip, but based on what I have seen, it is a definite upgrade!!

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I always had Nikon way back to the late1970s. I wouldve love to give and it a deserving five-star review but theres a rational reason for it why not. The D 7500 camera is a good (built) product and has a good image quality but as like most things these days is technologically overdone. I used to have an F2. You put in the film you knew the film speed. there were two settings you were concerned with: shutter speed and aperture. the rest was up to your ability to either meter or estimate the light and do good image composition to create your masterpiece shots... Fast-forward to today and you end up with several hundred settings if not more. A high-speed computer that can also take pictures... If you quickly need to grab the camera and take an action shot, you guaranteed always have the wrong settings.... or compared with any smart phone by the time youre able to take the shot its long gone.... A settings and configuration menu so extensive that from time to time you need to pull out the reference manual again... The most ridiculous thing that would deserve a 1 star or better a 1 (-5) star review is what Nikon calls "smart bridge," the Wi-Fi connectivity. I guess the call this "smart bridge" because that idea was conceived by a dummy for dummies. Mustve been a college kid who had no idea of photography and who also wrote the app software. (if it works the first place) It is not real Wi-Fi. You first need a Bluetooth connection to a smart phone and then the app on the smart phone in order to download the images from the camera via Wi-Fi however, the image size is limited to 2 MB...!?!?! WTF? on a camera that produces image files up to 26 MB in size? DUH? The Wi-Fi settings are fixed and you cannot change them to connect to an existing Wi-Fi network. WTF? Plain English: idiotic beyond comprehension. just imagine yourself being out in the field or on a far far away island or in the middle of the desert or wherever... More clutter more equipment and pointlessly for nothing. when I bought it I was happy it had Wi-Fi until I figured out how absurd concoction their so-called Wi-Fi is. So I go conventional I just plug it in or pull the SD chip out and insert it in my computer. You can read online much about professionals as well as others complaining about this. But apparently Nikon is mum and ignorant hence their sales are going further down as data shows. No wonder. Definitely not (professional) client driven anymore as they used to be their heyday.

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I told myself I would use my D300 until the day it stopped working. Well, needless to say, when the D7500 was announced, it sounded like exactly what I was looking for in my next camera...even though my D300 is still running strong with 85k+ shutters. While the D500 is the logical upgrade (if you buy into the whole "pro" vs "consumer" marketing spin), its price makes the upgrade unattractive. The D7500 takes so much of what is great about the D500 and offers it in a more affordable body. At first, I questioned my upgrade, but after a week of shooting with the D7500, I couldnt be happier. Below are the pros & cons that I see based on my experience thus far, and attached is a vertical crop from a horizontal image I shot the other day. Pros: - a much appreciated upgrade in technology (sensor, ISO capabilities, auto focus, metering, video, etc.) - lighter and a more portable than my D300 - 8fps - ISO capabilities and noise handling are phenomenal - much more pleasing colors - quiet shooting mode is nice, and overall the shutter is much quieter - Snapseed and the ability to sync to my phone is awesome. While I dont plan to backup everything to my phone continuously, it is a feature that is going to be handy when needed. Also, when I tested the continuous backup, it worked flawlessly. - the tilt out screen is surprisingly useful considering I didnt expect to use it at all - Live view is much more useful Cons: - still cant get used to the top dial button that has two different levels to it. I can easily adjust the top dial (Auto, P, A, S, etc.) but the lower level dial (S, CL, CH, etc.) is much more difficult for me to change than how Im used to adjusting those settings on the D300. - while I appreciate the lighter camera, there is something I miss about feeling such a rock solid camera body in my hand, such as the D300. When you pickup the D300, you know its a serious machine and that itll last for years to come. However, when I pick up the D7500, its plastic body just leaves me wanting to know if itll hold its own and last 9 years like my D300 did. - its slightly shorter than my D300, and as such the right hand grip just doesnt quite feel the same. It feels a little more cramped than the D300 which fit my hand perfectly. - the battery seems to have slightly less life to it than that of my D300, but it is still reasonable. - when shooting video and focusing with live view, the camera seems to struggle with auto focusing at times, especially if youre using the touch screen to specify the focal point. Neutral: - many people are slamming the D7500 for only having a single memory card slot, but to me it doesnt matter. Im also no professional, but in the 10+ years of shooting digital SLRs with single slot memory, I cant say Ive ever had a card fail on me. To me, the card technology seems to have come so far that if you invest in a good, quality card, this shouldnt matter to you. - 4K video. Maybe Ill find this useful down the road, but I dont see myself doing a ton of this. - "Effects" such as miniature mode, toy camera, etc. These are fun, and are enjoyable in point in shoots. However, even in my point and shoots, I cant say they get much usage

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I absolutely love this camera. I upgraded from a Nikon D5xxx and did not need the full blown capabilities of the D500. The D7500 was the perfect upgrade. I use a 128GB stick in it and I have set it up to my taste and Im taking pictures. I love the speed of the 7500 in continuous mode and the fact I can take a LOT of pictures of fast moving scenes without filling the buffer in a few seconds. The touchscreen is great, works really well and is very intuitive. I love that it also pulls out and you can use it for low shots or high (above the crowd) shots. The D500 sensor with its integrated AE is superb and provides all the power of the more expensive model in a sensibly priced model. I have no need for a second SD slot, and the camera fist my hands so well, a battery grip would just make it heavier and bulkier.

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I only got this camera yesterday, but I am already SO impressed by it! I was concerned about the mega pixels only being 20.9, but I cant even notice the difference.The rapid fire is absolutely brilliant! The fastest is 8 frames per second and seems to be even better when set on "sport". UPDATE: Ive had this camera for a little over two weeks now. I still cant find anything I dislike about it. I previously had a D5300 and the 7500 completely blows it out of the water, obviously lol. I still highly recommend this camera to anyone who is interested in buying it. All of the photos that I included with this review are originals right off of the SD card and not touched up via Lightroom or Photoshop.

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Im a long time Nikon fanboy and owner. Bought a D7500 mostly for its low light specs only to be super disappointed on a my first trip out. (yes, I should have tested before going into the field, but hopefully this review will help save you the pain) When using this body with a 18-200 VR lens in low light situations, frames have a consistent red streak across the edge of the frame. The two sample pictures here were taken sequentially and same settings, with the camera rotated 180 deg. I discussed this problem with my local camera shop, and they were able to easily recreated the problem with one of their D7500s & lens. I have not gotten any useful support from Nikon itself after 3 months of trying. If you plan to do low light photography, I would stay away from this camera, and frankly, after trying hard to work with Nikon support on this problem, I plan to finally move away from Nikon all together. *Final Update: this cameras low light capabilities are not compatible with earlier Nikon VR lenses. See comments for details.

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3 week update: Have used this camera daily. It is simple to learn, simple to use, a real joy for wildlife. After 3 week the menus and controls are becoming more 2nd nature. Because of all the features I expected that it would take longer to start feeling familiar. Occasionally I have to go back to a reference to find what I am looking for, but really, this camera is an amazingly intuitive piece of technology even for a beginner. Your camera takes good pictures goes the joke. It is no joke with the D7500. I have used the Coolpx P900 for ~two years. I have never used a DSLR. The D7500 is my first. The pix with this review were taken on the first two days I owned it. These pix were shot on shutter preferred and manual. I had no idea a DSLR camera could be so amazing and forgiving. If I can do this, imagine what you can do if you have knowledge and experience. I carefully researched DSLRs before making this purchase. You will find that if you do this camera is highly rated. Let those reviews will guide your decision. I got this camera because I wanted a camera I could grow into, a camera that would work for wildlife and action, and a camera that was considered an excellent buy in professional reviews. I also chose Nikon because I was familiar with the layout and language because of my P900. For me it was a spectacular choice. I highly recommend it.

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Ive only had this camera for less than a day and have taken about a dozen keepers. The build quality is outstanding compared to the D3400. The D7500 I believe, will fill the role as an enthusiast camera. Not quite up to its big brother the D500, but at least in the ways that really matter to me it is spot on. BTW, I gave 4 stars for battery life but that is based on what Ive read. I havent had enough experience with the camera to have my own opinion. Also keep in mind that picture quality is a function of the photographer and the lens even more than the camera IMHO. The first big difference to me over the D3400 is the focusing system. I havent had a chance to use it track birds but the 51 focus points and the 3D and group modes seem to work well in simple tests. Well see how they perform for me in real world scenarios like tracking a bird. Regardless the focusing system is much better than the D3400. Another important feature for me is the ability to shoot at 8 frames / second and up to 50 RAW photos before the buffer fills up. I love the touchscreen display and the fact that it articulates up and down. I do wish it moved further down for taking overhead shots, but it will work fine. Being able to use the touch screen for menus and photo review is a real plus. "My Menu" is a great time saver. You can add your most often accessed menu items to My Menu so you can get to them quickly without scrolling through gobs of menus. Auto-bracketing is an important feature for me too. I often shoot real estate (my wife and I are real estate agents and though we hire pro photographers, I often shoot additional shots). Bracketing allows me to create HDR photos that dont have windows that are all blown out, etc. There are a ton more options on the D7500 over the D3400 or other entry-level DSLRs so if you are moving up or if this is your first DSLR, do yourself a favor and get a companion book. I bought "Nikon D7500 Experience - The Photography Guide to Operation and Image Creation with the Nikon D7500" by Douglas Klostermann. Very, very helpful. The shots are from the National Cemetery in Sarasota Florida.

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