Nikon's Coolpix P5000, which evolved from the earlier P3 and P4, takes a wide array of features that appeal to experienced photographers and assembles them in a sturdily built pocket camera with an optically stabilized 3.5X zoom lens. Whereas this 10-megapixel model provides plenty of settings that enable no-brainer snapshots, even these automatic options are oriented toward people who know their way around photography. Instead of including a lot of trendy bells and whistles, the P5000 stands out for its range of exposure controls, comfortable and efficient design, and high-quality viewfinder.

A little larger than the typical ultracompact point-and-shoot, the P5000 has just enough extra bulk to make it fit nicely in the hand. Its rubberized grip and thumb pad provide a comfortable hold on the camera's magnesium body, and position the photographer's right thumb to reach the control dial or the four-way controller pad below with just a small shift. Rotating the control dial adjusts exposure settings or cycles through the camera's menu options. In conjunction with the camera's programmable function button, the dial allows quick changes to ISO settings, image quality or size, white balance, or optical image stabilization. These controls, plus a mode dial on top of the camera and a straightforward menu system, make adjusting settings on the P5000 quick and intuitive.

The mode dial lays out your basic options: There are manual, priority, and programmed automatic modes, in addition to a fully automatic mode and a scene mode option that provides access to 16 selections and a voice recorder. There are also two modes—High ISO and Anti Shake—that increase your chances of getting a good result automatically in low light without flash or with moving subjects. The remaining slots on the dial are filled by a video mode and the setup menu. One thing some photographers might miss is a custom mode for quick access to a frequently used group of settings, a feature I really like.

This camera offers the most flexibility when you're shooting at the wide end of its zoom range—not that the 36mm (35mm camera equivalent) focal length is by any means especially wide. You have 10 aperture settings to select from, starting at f/2.7 for relatively fast shots. When you zoom all the way in to the 126mm (35mm equivalent) limit, your aperture options drop to four, ranging from f/5.3 to f/7.6 for relatively slow shots. Combined with the camera's effective lens-based optical image stabilization, its 8-second slowest shutter speed, top light-sensitivity setting of ISO 2000, and the fast setting for wide angle makes the P5000 a versatile low-light photographic tool.

The only drawback for low-light shooting is the camera's autofocus system, which, already not the speediest on the block in good light, slows down noticeably under low-light conditions. Worse, there's no manual focus available when the light level gets too low for the AF to function. That said, the P5000 does provide a broad selection of autofocus options so that you can opt for the one most likely to work best in a given situation.

You can choose single or continuous AF, and there's an infinity focus mode for shooting through reflective surfaces, too. The camera's focusing limit mode will speed up AF performance a little when you're shooting distant subjects. The autofocus point can be selected automatically by the camera or by you, via the four-way controller. You'll also find a face-detection autofocus option among the scene modes, but it's not one of the better implementations of this technology I've seen, and I didn't find it quick or accurate enough to be very useful.

At wide angle, the P5000's shutter speed settings top out at a speedy 1/2,000 second; they stop at 1/1,000 second when you're zoomed in. You can also shoot subjects as close as 1.6 inches in macro mode when you're at the 36mm-equivalent focal length. I was able to get good results with the flash even when photographing high-key and high-contrast subjects very close up.

If you opt to purchase Nikon's 24mm (35mm equivalent) wide-angle lens converter for the P5000, you'll be able to take advantage of a feature that distinguishes this camera: Its Distortion Control function straightens out curved lines, or barrel distortion, in wide-angle shots and saves a copy of the corrected image in-camera. A 378mm (35mm equivalent) telephoto converter is available as well.

SLR shooters looking for an everyday pocket camera should be aware that this type of device's exposure settings won't function quite like those of their SLRs. Even in manual and aperture-priority modes, the P5000 automatically adjusts the aperture every time the focal length of the lens is changed. It doesn't seem to alter the shutter speed much, making shutter-priority the camera's de facto predominant mode. To limit changes to the aperture when zooming in and out, you can select the camera's fixed-aperture option. This setting keeps the aperture as close to the previously selected f-stop as possible when you change the focal length in manual or aperture-priority mode.

Other exposure-control tools include program shift, which keeps the automatic exposure value constant while shifting aperture and shutter speeds; auto exposure bracketing with steps adjustable between +/-0.3 and +/-1; and four metering options that include an AF-point-linked spot meter.

The P5000's flexible flash options are noteworthy. In addition to built-in flash settings that include front and rear curtain sync, there's a hot shoe and support for Nikon's iTTL system. The P5000 can't control off-camera flash units independently, as some higher-end Nikons can, but you can disable its built-in flash and apply settings such as flash exposure compensation to a mounted Nikon unit.

If fill flash doesn't work out for you and you want to open up the shadows in an image without losing highlight detail, you can apply Nikon's useful D-Lighting software processing in-camera after the shot. A notable omission in this camera's exposure-control toolbox is a live histogram, although one is available in review mode.

Whatever the lighting situation you're dealing with, you'll appreciate the P5000's high-quality LCD. It presents a discernable image even at light levels that are quite low, and its antiglare coating makes it viewable in daylight as well. The LCD's wide viewing angle also lets you hold the camera at high or low angles or off to the side and still use the screen as a viewfinder. In very bright situations or when you want to shoot discreetly with the LCD off, you can use the camera's little optical viewfinder, which offers a clear view of 80 percent of the image you'll take.

The camera provides a range of special settings and effects that should appeal to avid photographers. These options include adjustable contrast, sharpening, saturation, and monochrome settings that replicate the effects of various color filters in black-and-white film photography. There's also an interval shooting mode for time-lapse photography.—next: Putting the P5000 to the Test