Nikon COOLPIX P500 12.1 MP Digital Camera - Black

This is a great camera with nice features, easy to use for non professional users, as me. I got a refurbished one and so far works perfect. The zoom is fantastic and takes nice pictures even on maximum zoom. The flash also is good and a nice thing I notice is that the wide angle it get without zoom allows you to get large groups of people even on small places (birthdays is our most common use). The only con I found is the battery duration which is lack specially with flash and LCD active, even that my purchase was with an extra battery, finally got two more and an external charger ($13) in order to have power always I need. Something could improve is the automatic focus trying to take long distance but zoom in pictures, which use to take time for the camera to adjust correctly, but is not a big deal if you want to take a good picture which needs some time. So far I would recommend it if you don't want to deal with pro cameras with a lot of options that makes too complicate to take a familiar picture in a birthday, but getting excellent results on your images.

I bought this product because once a year or so I return to my hometown of San Francisco and take pictures of my favorite people and places. I was getting excellent shots of my friends with my Canon Elph 880 IS camera, but with a maximum of 14X magnification, I was missing a lot of possibilities with scenes. I was not willing to walk down streets so steep they cut steps into them, and then back up similar streets just to get close. The 36X optical magnification on the Nikon P500 solved the problem. That is the same as you would get on a SLR with an 800 mm lens. In addition, the depth of field is excellent. This is not a SLR, so I wouldn't recommend it for studio portraits, but the autofocus is fast, the thing weighs about as much as a pocket camera, and you don't miss shots while you fumble with lenses. It practically begs to be taken on trips.

I give 5 out of 5 for the cameras features but only 4 for the camera overall. My reason? Once we get past 15x zoom the envelope begins to be pushed especially when it comes to a point and shoot camera. For all extensive purposes these cameras ARE cheap SLR's. So we go past 15x zoom and you better have a tripod or real steady hand and even the steadiest isn't going to cut the mustard. That being said, I LOVE THIS CAMERA. Even though it is back at Nikon getting repaired. HEY I bought refurbished, what do you expect? I know it will all work out, it has before and the seller offered refunds, replacements, etc... They bent over backward but I figured having the 90 day NIKON warranty I might as well go to the source. Nikon stands behind their product. I also bought a 3 year parts and labor extended warranty from the seller to keep my investment covered. They even offer a stupid mans warranty for a few mor bucks. Maybe I shoulda got that one. This camera takes crisp clear photos and the sports setting is awesome snapping upward of 11 photos. It already helped with my sons bat swing. The video recorder is second to none but I am using a 93mb/s Pro Extreme sd card. At 8g this only offers 30 min of video time but you can change the video size. We don't need to be uploading Hi-Def to youtube, do we? At night with my tripod I got amazing shots of the moon and Venus. I also took it for a test run on moving lights and city-scapes with some interesting results. It will take months for me to master this new toy of mine but I will enjoy every moment. Do not be afraid to buy refurbished. Just hurry up and start playing with your camera to make sure the problem is not with a function you won't learn about after the warranty expires. We have now stepped into the 46x zoom range. This sorta scares me. Remember ya never know who is watching and at these distances ya wouldn't see them if ya did... Now if your some sort of pervert well then I suggest you pay a lil more and get this years model. I imagine next year we'll be hittin the 50's anyway. Great Camera and I would suggest it to anyone. There are a million idiots out there that paid over $400 for this camera. If you can get it for $250 or under ya got a great deal. I hope this review not only helped but made you smile as well... Peace Out my friends.

I was a canon super zoom user but the quality and capacity of the sensor of the Nikon compared to the one offered by the latest Canon equivalent model led me to make the move.
The moment I opened the box and held the camera I felt that I was in for a suprise. Fully thin plastic and hence light weight gives the feeling of fragility and not the ruggedness needed to hold the physics of the zoom itself. Major positive is the quality of the images, great sensor indeed, I wasn´t wrong about that. Now, if only that light information could also produce a focused image more cosnsitently, it would make of the Nikon P500 a superb camera. Granted, my old Canon super zoom has a shorter zoom, less quality of images,not HD movies, but I can capture and film the scenes I need getting the focused 99% of the time, even in low light conditions. As long as landscapes don´t move and I have my tripod at hand, I will choose the Nikon for those tasks... for the rest, I´ll fall back to the reliability and durability of Canon.

There are some new possibilities like panorama pictures,very good zoom compared to the Lumix I had before.Still sometimes some functions are not working, I have to reset the factory "original reset" only then can I do again some things. Can be a software problem I do not know. THe quality difference by daylight is not so big, the bigger development I can see by night photos, there it is good.(Video is no difference by dark.)Anyway still need time to practise more.