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Nikon has entered the competitive ultra-zoom digicam market with the Coolpix P90, which combines a 24x optical zoom lens with a 6.13 x 4.6mm CCD sensor with an effective resolution of 12.1 megapixels. It's not the longest zoom lens on the digicam market (Olympus still commands a lead with 26x on the SP-560UZ) and the P90 is a large and chunky camera. But it has a few features to attract photographers who don't want an SLR.

Lest you think the P90 is targeted at photo enthusiasts, it's a JPEG-only model and those who shoot movies will be disappointed that only VGA and QVGA resolutions are supported. There are also lots more automated shooting modes than manual adjustments, including some that will please family photographers.

Build and Ergonomics
Like most ultra-zoom digicam, the Coolpix P90 is made from black plastic. Build quality is reasonably good, although the camera feels quite plasticky. Supplied with the camera are a lens cap and neck strap - but no lens hood and the lens cap only fits on when the camera is switched off. A tether is provided to prevent it from being mislaid.

Front view of the Coolpix P90 with the lens in the wide-angle position. (Source: Nikon.)

Kitted out with battery, SD card and neck strap, the P90 weighs almost 500 grams and is rather bulky. The front is dominated by the lens, which protrudes approximately 60 mm from the camera body and has a diameter of 62 mm at its tip. Powering up the camera extends the lens a further 15 mm to the wide position and a further 45 mm to full tele extension.

A deep handgrip positions the index finger above the shutter release button on the top panel, which also contains the on/off button and mode dial. The zoom lever surrounds the shutter button and moves through approximately 30 degrees as you go from wide to full tele position. Zoom movement is smooth and provides adequate precision for family snapshooters (the main target market for this camera).

The mode dial carries 11 settings, which are outlined in the Shooting Modes section below. Also on the top panel is the pop-up flash, which is raised manually by pressing a button on the left side of the flash mounting.


Top view of the Coolpix P90 showing the mode dial, shutter button and zoom lever. (Source: Nikon.)

Covering most of the rear panel, the 3-inch TFT LCD monitor can be tilted upwards through 90 degrees and downwards through 45 degrees for low or high-angle shooting. With such a heavy camera, holding it above your head (or even at head level) quickly becomes very tiring but this adjustability can be convenient for quick snapshots.


A back view of the Coolpix P90 with the CD screen 'parked'. (Source: Nikon.)

Full articulation, where the LCD is mounted at the side of the camera, would provide significantly more freedom. Unfortunately, the resolution of this monitor is disappointing at only 230,000 pixels and, although it does have an anti-reflection coating, readability is far from ideal in bright outdoor lighting. The viewfinder has a reasonably large eyepiece for a digicam but suffers from low resolution and, therefore, fails to impress.


Another view of the P90's back with the LCD screen pulled out for low-angle shooting. (Source: Nikon.) 

The battery and card compartment is entered via a hatch in the base panel. The supplied EN-EL5 rechargeable lithium-ion battery is rated for 200 shots/charge. Beside the battery/card compartment is a metal-lined tripod socket, which is close to the centre of the base panel (but just over 20mm off the camera's optical axis). A small rubber plug on the right side panel lifts up to reveal a USB Mini B socket for connecting the camera to a computer or TV screen.

Sensor and Image Processing
The sensor in the P90 is a pretty standard '1/2.33-inch type' CCD chip that measures 6.13 x 4.6mm and has 12.7 million photosites (of which 12.1 million are used for image creation). Linked to it is Nikon's EXPEED image processor, which underpins standard functions like the VR image stabilisation system, Active D-Lighting function as well as new additions like the Smart Portrait System, which combines face detection with smile and blink detection and in-camera red-eye correction. (More on these functions below.)

The P90 offers sensitivity settings up to ISO 6400 but resolution is reduced to 3M at ISO 3200 and ISO 6400. Users can set the sensitivity range for the auto ISO mode to ISO 64-100, ISO 64-200 or ISO 64-400 with the Fixed Range Auto function in the ISO sub-menu.

Still images are recorded as JPEGs, with 11 image sizes and three compression ratios selectable. Eight of the sizes are in 4:3 aspect ratio with two at 16:9 and one at each of 3:2 and 1:1 aspect settings. Typical file sizes are shown in the table below.

In Movie mode, you can choose from six settings: VGA at 30 and 15 frames/second, QVGA at 15 frames/second in colour, B&W and sepia and time-lapse movie, which records images at VGA resolution without sound and at pre-set intervals and allows them to be played back at 30 frames/second. The maximum clip length for movies is 25 minutes, regardless of the resolution setting or capacity of the memory card.

Typical clip lengths for a 512MB card are shown in the table below.

You can't use the optical zoom function while recording movie clips; only digital zoom is enabled. The image stabilisation system also changes automatically when movie mode is engaged and only Electronic VR, which crops the frame to eliminate camera shake, is available. This setting is engaged by default in movie mode.

Shooting Modes
Shooting modes accessed via the mode dial include full auto, P, S, A and M shooting modes, along with two user memories, Movie and Scene mode settings and a Sport continuous position that boosts the ISO to 640 and above and sets image resolution to 3M size (2048 x 1536 pixels), while engaging the burst shooting mode. Focus, exposure and white balance are fixed with the first image in a burst but up to 45 consecutive shots can be recorded at up to 15 frames/second.

Sixteen scene modes cater for a variety of common subject types, while the new Scene Auto Selector function automatically chooses the appropriate mode from the following options: Landscape, Night landscape, Backlight, Portrait, Night portrait and Close-up. The remaining scene modes, which must be selected via the sub-menu, include Party/Indoor, Copy, Sunset, Dusk/Dawn, Food, Museum, Fireworks show and Panorama assist.

In full auto mode, the only items accessible in the shooting menu are the image size and quality settings. In the Scene modes access to these settings is at the end of the scene menu but other image parameters are largely non-adjustable - although some colour adjustment is provided in the Food mode to compensate for artificial lighting.

Selecting the Portrait or Night Portrait mode automatically engages the 'Smart Portrait' functions like face detection (which can identify up to 12 human faces), motion detection  and blink detection.  A warning 'Did someone blink?' may be displayed on the LCD screen. Images may also be processed to improve skin tones in the Portrait mode. The flash is disabled and slow shutter speeds are set in the Night Landscape mode, while the Close-up mode enables the lens to focus down to 1 cm.

The flash is also disabled in the Museum and Fireworks modes, with the latter setting focus to infinity. The Copy mode is designed for copying text and drawings on documents or whiteboards. High contrast is prioritised in this mode. In the Backlight mode, flash fill is engaged to brighten faces that are otherwise in shadow.

The Panorama mode lets users decide the direction in which they will pan the camera and provides reference images to help users to line up subsequent shots. Images are combined with the supplied Panorama Maker software.

Moving to the P, S, A and M shooting modes opens the full suite of camera controls and users can adjust lens aperture and shutter settings in 1/3EV steps in all four modes. Groups of frequently-used settings can be saved in the two user memories, along with settings for the zoom position; metering, flash and AF modes; image size and quality settings; ISO sensitivity and processing settings for D-Lighting, noise reduction and distortion control.

The Optimise Image sub-menu contains six settings: normal, softer, vivid, more vivid, portrait, custom and black-and-white. In the custom mode you can adjust contrast, sharpening and saturation across +/- two steps above and below the normal levels.


Settings provided in the Optimise Image sub-menu.

The Continuous shooting sub-menu contains five settings: single, continuous, BSS, multi-shot 16 and interval timer shooting. Nikon's BSS (Best Shot Selector) function takes up to 10 shots while the shutter button is held down and saves the sharpest of them.

The P90 adds two unusual settings to its self-timer modes, in addition to the standard two- or ten-second delay settings. The new Smile Timer mode engages the camera's face detection functions and delays triggering the shutter until a smile is detected. Timing delay begins and the indicator lamp stops blinking a second before face detection is activated. It starts blinking again when a smile is detected and the shutter is triggered.

With the Blink Proof setting, the shutter release is also delayed but the camera takes two photographs when the shutter is triggered. The image in which the subject's eyes are open is saved. Neither mode will work when the camera is set for manual focusing or if the Black & White option is chosen in the Optimise Image sub-menu. 

Playback and Software
Playback options are pretty standard and include single and index vies, the latter with four, nine or 16 thumbnails. Calendar playback is also supported. You can magnify part of a shot up to 10 times with playback zoom and move the enlarged area with the arrow pad buttons.


The standard playback mode with shootign data overlaid on the image.

Pressing the Display button lets you hide and show image information or display a thumbnail with shooting data and a brightness histogram. You can add voice memos up to 20 seconds long to images displayed in playback mode.


Thumbnail playback with shooting data and brightness histogram.

Slideshow playback is also supported, along with limited editing facilities. The Quick Retouch button lets you apply global corrections to the brightness, saturation and contrast in a displayed shot and save the result separately. Three levels are provided: High, Normal and Low. The same three settings are provided for post-capture D-Lighting adjustments. In each case, the adjustments are pretty subtle.


The Retouch function in playback mode.

Cropping is linked with the playback zoom function. As you zoom in a scissors icon appears on the screen. When the on-screen image is as you want it, pressing the OK button lets you save the cropped image as a separate file. The P90 also offers Nikon's Small Picture function, which copies the image at VGA, QVGA or QQVGA size for online usage.

You can also add a black border to selected images and save the result separately. Three widths are provided.
The software disk contains Nikon's standard bundle of applications, which includes Nikon Transfer for uploading images to a computer, ArcSoft Panorama Maker, Apple QuickTime 7 and my Picturetown Utility. The last two applications are only compatible with Windows XP and Vista. Microsoft DirectX 9 is also provided for Windows users. We've covered these in our review of the Coolpix S710.

Performance
Performance-wise, the review camera was something of a 'curate's egg' (parts of it were excellent). Colour accuracy was good in our Imatest tests and saturation was restrained for a small-sensor digicam, although reds were slightly boosted and skin hues a little off-the-mark. Metering was also generally good, although exposures tended to favour shadow detail over highlights and bright areas were frequently blow-out in outdoor shots.

Imatest showed resolution to be significantly lower than expectations for a 12-megapixel camera and revealed edge and corner softening at all aperture and focal length settings. The graph below shows the results of our tests at seven focal length settings.

Resolution began to decline at ISO 400 and continued to fall to ISO 1600, after which there was a steep plunge as capture resolution was dramatically reduced with the ISO 3200 and ISO 6400 settings. The graph below shows the results of our tests.

Noise started to become visible in low-light shots at ISO 400 and increased steadily as sensitivity was raised. With flash shots, usable images could be obtained at ISO settings as high as 800. However, even with flash, we wouldn't recommend shooting with ISO settings above 800 with this camera for images that will be printed larger than postcard size.

Lateral chromatic aberration was moderate at all focal length settings and we observed both green and purple fringing in shots taken in bright outdoor conditions. JPEG artefacts were also found along high-contrast edged when such images were magnified. A crop from an image magnified to 100% is shown below.

Barrel distortion was noticeable at the widest focal length setting but had been largely corrected by a quarter of a way along the zoom range.  Slight pincushioning set in at focal lengths of about 12mm and increased very gradually thereafter. Digital zoom shots were slightly soft and a little artefact-affected but better than expected for the degree of magnification provided.

Backlit subjects were competently handled and, although it was possible to force the lens to flare, flare was well constrained in most backlit situations. The autofocusing system was reasonably fast and usually accurate with subjects that were centrally located but we had a few misses with off-centre subjects. The flash was capable of illuminating an average-sized room at all ISO settings and illumination levels were even throughout our tests.

Close-up performance was unspectacular but the test camera was capable of delivering some attractive shots when the lens was at its widest angle of view. Movie quality was pretty much as you'd expect for VGA and QVGA capture and the accompanying audio quality was fairly ordinary.

Auto white balance performance was typical of a point-and-shoot digicam. The camera failed to remove the orange cast of incandescent lighting in our standard tests but produced close-to-natural colours under fluorescent lighting. Both manual pre-sets over-corrected colours slightly but the manual measurement setting produced neutral colours under both types of lighting.

The test camera powered up and shut down in just under a second, which is relatively fast. However shot-to-shot times averaged 2.8 seconds without flash and 4.3 seconds with, which is sluggish. We measured an average capture lag of 0.75 seconds, which reduced to less than 0.1 seconds with pre-focusing. It took an average of 2.3 seconds to process each high-resolution image.

In the standard continuous shooting mode, shots were captured at intervals of 0.7 seconds. It took 11.8 seconds to process a burst of 10 shots. Swapping to the Multi-shot 16 continuous shooting mode, we found the camera recorded 16 shots at intervals of just over 0.1 seconds. It took 3.4 seconds to process this burst and store the result as a single 2592 x 1944 pixel JPEG file.

Buy this camera if:
- You'd like an ultra-zoom camera with an adjustable LCD screen.
- You want an ultra-zoom camera for time-lapse recording.

Don't buy this camera if:
- You want high image resolution at all lens focal lengths and aperture settings.
- You want to shoot raw files (this camera is JPEG only).
- You require high-quality images in dim lighting (above ISO 800 quality deteriorates rapidly).
- You want to shoot widescreen or high-definition video (VGA at 30 frames/second is the Coolpix P90's best option).

IMATEST GRAPHS

SAMPLE IMAGES

Auto white balance with incandescent lighting. 

Auto white balance with fluorescent lighting.

Close-up. 15.1mm focal length, ISO 100, 1/174 second at f/5.


Close-up. 32.7mm focal length, ISO 1600, 1/160 second at f/5.6.


Close-up with backlighting; 37.7mm focal length, ISO 100, 1/737 second at f/5.

Digital zoom. 441.6mm focal length, ISO 200, 1/60 second at f/5.


4.6mm focal length, ISO 100, 1/489 seconds at f/8.

132mm focal length, ISO 100, 1/176 seconds at f/5.

5.2mm focal length, ISO 100, 8 seconds at f/3.5.

Image sensor: 6.13 x 4.6mm CCD sensor with 12.7 million photosites (12.1 megapixels effective)
Lens:  4.6-110.4mm f/2.8-5 Zoom-Nikkor (26-624mm in 35mm format)
Zoom ratio: 24x optical, up to 4x digital
Image formats: Stills – JPEG (Exif); Movies – AVI/wav
Image Sizes: Stills -    4000 x 3000 (12M), 3264 x 2448 (8M), 2592 x 1944 (5M), 2048 x 1536 (3M), 1600 x 1200 (2M), 1280 x 960 (1M), 1024×768 (PC), 640 x 480 (TV), 3984 x 2656 (3:2), 3968 x 2232 (16:9), 2992 x 2992 (1:1), 1920 x 1080 (16:9 2M); Movies – VGA/QVGA at 30 fps
Shutter speed range:  8 to 1/2000 second (1/20 to 1/400 second in Continuous High mode)
Self-timer: 2 and 10 sec. duration (Smile Timer & Blink proof modes)
Image Stabilisation:  Image sensor shift VR
Exposure Compensation: +/- 2EV in 1/3EV steps
Focus system/range: Contrast-detect AF; range: 10 cm to infinity; macro to 1 cm
Exposure metering/control: 256-segment matrix metering, Centre-weighted metering, Spot metering, Spot AF area metering
Shooting modes: Auto mode, Scene auto selector, Scene modes, P, S, A, and M exposure modes, BSS (Best Shot Selector), Optimise image, Flash exp. comp., Noise reduction, Distortion control, Date imprint, Black border, Movie mode, Sport continuous mode, voice memo, and Voice recording; 17 Scene pre-sets
ISO range: Auto (ISO 64-800), ISO 64, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600; ISO 3200 and 6400
White balance: Auto, Preset manual, Daylight, Incandescent, Fluorescent, Cloudy, Flash
Flash modes/range (ISO auto): Auto, Auto with red-eye reduction, Off, Fill flash, Slow sync, Rear-Curtain sync
Sequence shooting:  Approx. 1.4 fps; Continuous H (approx. 11 fps), Continuous M (approx. 6 fps), Continuous L (approx. 4 fps); Multi-shot 16; Sport continuous mode (approx. 15 fps)
Storage Media: Approx. 47MB internal memory plus SD/SDHC expansion slot
Viewfinder: 0.24-inch, approx. 230,000 dot EVF
LCD monitor: 3-inch vari-angle TFT LCD (approx. 230,000 dots) with anti-reflection coating
Power supply:  EN-EL5 Rechargeable Li-ion Battery; CIPA rated for approx. 200 shots/charge
Dimensions (wxhxd): Approx. 114 x 83 x 99 mm (excluding projections)
Weight: Approx. 460 g (without battery and card)