Manual Control Options
The Nikon Coolpix P60 has a full array of modes, including Program and Manual shooting. Since this compact camera is targeted toward advanced point-and-shooters, the camera includes controls to change aperture and shutter speed for creative control.
Focus
Auto Focus
There are three autofocus types: Face Priority, Auto, and Center Focus. The system uses a 9-point system and focuses at 1.33 feet to infinity in normal range shooting. For close-up shots like a wedding ring, the camera can focus at 4 inches to infinity in Macro mode.
The P60 includes Nikon’s face detection system, Face Priority. Nikon’s technology detects up to a reported five faces in a given scene. Users can press the shutter halfway and the camera automatically focuses, showing a green bracket around the focused subject. For moving faces, the camera displays double yellow lines in the form of a box surrounding the face. The face tracking system works to a degree. Angled profiles tend to have limited face detection.
Manual Focus
The Nikon P60 is supposed to have manual focus, although neither we nor the Nikon representative could figure out how to access it. We assumed manual focus was not activated on the prototype model we looked at. We expect the manual focus on the final version will work.
Exposure
Users can change exposure though the manual shooting modes with options to control f-stop and shutter speed values. There is also EV compensation, accessed through the right directional on the four-way controller. EV compensation is displayed as a vertical scale and can be controlled in +/- steps.
Metering
The Nikon P60 has the following Metering modes: Matrix, Center-Weighted, Spot, and Spot AF. That's a decent selection of modes that should cover a range of varied lighting conditions, indoors and out.
White Balance
The Coolpix camera has different white balance settings for various lighting conditions: Daylight, Cloudy, Fluorescent, Incandescent, Flash, and Manual. Some point-and-shoots offer one to three fluorescent settings for mixed lighting, but the Nikon P60 only has one. Instead, the camera has a Manual white balance setting so users can manually adjust it by shooting a white card.
ISO
The P60 has a slight change in ISO range from its predecessor, the P50. The P60 has a minimal sensitivity range of ISO 80, while the P50 started at ISO 64. That slight change in the lowest sensitivity setting shouldn’t make too much of a difference. The P60 still has the other following settings: 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, and a maximum of ISO 2000.
Users can control sensitivity in three ways: Fixed ISO, to choose Auto or any of the sensitivity values; High ISO, to set the camera for low light shooting; or High Sensitivity, which combines High ISO, BSS, and Vibration Reduction.
Shutter Speed
Unlike many point-and-shoots, the Nikon P60 offers shutter speed controls to help adjust for action and shooting. The specifications on shutter speed values were not available at the time of publication, but they will be included in the full tested review on DigitalCameraInfo.com in the coming months.
Aperture
The Nikon P60 offers aperture control to help depth of field. Aperture opens up to f/3.6 when zoomed out and f/4.5 when zoomed in. Users can control f-stop through the multi-selector by changing the values up and down on the four-way controller.
