Nikon Coolpix P80 Camera - Great Outdoors, Not Indoors

Last year, I took over as the yearbook adviser at my high school. At first, we made do with a couple point and shoot cameras, but I quickly realized that we needed something better to do sports photography. A point and shoot just wasn't going to cut it.

So, I did some research. I didn't want to plunk down the cash for a dSLR set up, even though they looked sweet. When I saw the megazoom cameras, like the P80, I thought they'd be just as good - just without the interchangeable lenses. So, I shelled out the cash, ordered a Nikon P80, and at first I was in love.

Compared with what I had been using (a regular point and shoot camera with a 3x zoom), the Nikon P80 was awesome. The first weekend I had it, I took it to a Step Team competition inside a gym, and thanks to the continuous-shot sports mode I was able to take some decent pictures of the team in action. I didn't know at the time that they were way too noisy and needlessly low in resolution - I was just happy they came out!

Recently, I upgraded to a real dSLR setup - a Canon t1i with a standard zoom and a telephoto zoom lens. This has given me a much better appreciation of what is possible with a good digital camera, and looking back I can honestly assess what the P80 did well and didn't do well.

Outdoor Sports Photography - Good

The strongest area for the Nikon P80 is outdoor sports photography. You can manipulate the aperture and/or shutter speed settings to ensure that you get a high shutter speed and freeze the action. The incredible zoom length allows you to see all around the field from one vantage point. The focus can be a bit slow for fast moving sports (soccer), but my students and I were able to get some good shots of football and soccer in action.

The P80 really excelled at outdoor sports where I could predict where the action would be. I got a great shot of a kid sliding into third base in baseball. I got some great shots of the pitcher in softball. Between the available light from the sun and the programmable settings on the camera, the P80 is great for daytime, outdoor sports photography.

Indoor Sports Photography - Not So Good

Indoors, the camera isn't so good. If you've ever tried to take pictures inside a gym, you know that the light isn't very good. Taking a picture with a shutter speed of 1/125 or higher (which is the lowest I like to use for any kind of sports shooting) requires either more light or a high ISO. Too bad the P80 is horrible at high ISOs, and it doesn't seem to do much for noise reduction.

I was able to take some ok pictures of volleyball using a moderate ISO (400 or 800), but the pictures were inevitably very noisy. Using the continuous shot sports mode helped a bit, and the noise reduction seemed to work better. But, this also dropped the resolution to 3 megapixels and it dropped the overall quality of the image. If the light wasn't good, it would also adjust the shutter speed down to 1/60 or lower - not really a sports mode at all. The end result is that some pictures would come out ok, and others would come out blurred - but they would all have an ugly amount of noise in them.

Outdoor, Night Sports Photography - Oh Noes...

This is what made me give in and get the Canon t1i. My students and I tried to shoot a night football game with the Nikon P80, and it was a disaster. The poor lighting made it difficult to focus clearly. We shot some pictures with an 800 ISO and bumped up the exposure in post processing, and the pictures came out ok but extremely noisy. The results were more or less unuseable (although a good exercise in settings adjustment and post production for my students).

Other Indoor Photography - Eh...

Shooting other indoor events is hit or miss. If you're working in a well lit auditorium, you're good to go. The camera takes great pictures of subjects that are well light by a spotlight. I was able to take some great shots of the choir during our Spring concert.

When the lights aren't so good, though, you're options are limited. The spotlights on our stage don't reach the very front - where the podium is. When we have assemblies and people are speaking, it is almost impossible to focus clearly on the speaker. A shot without a flash comes out noisy (thanks to a high ISO) or blurry (thanks to a low shutter speed). Not a great trade-off...

Why not use the flash, you ask? This is really the killer problem with the camera. The built-in flash is not very strong, and it is not good at metering in my opinion. Shots with the flash always come out with harsh, over-exposed subjects and under-exposed backgrounds. Without a hot shoe, you can't add an external flash (which you could bounce off the ceiling). In the last six months, I found that I rarely used the flash on the camera at all, because the pictures just never came out looking that great.

Recap - The Good, the Bad, the Ugly

To recap...

Outdoor, daytime sports photography is awesome. I loved it when I got it, and I still do. My Canon t1i is better, but the Nikon Coolpix P80 was also a fraction of the price.

Indoor sports photography ain't so awesome. You can get some ok shots, but be prepared for no ise.

Night-time sports photography is a no go. The shots will be so under-exposed and/or noisy that you won't want to look at them.

Indoor events are hit or miss. Ample lighting on a stage makes the shots come out great. Using the built in flash makes them come out sub-par.

If the camera allowed for some kind of external flash (or a built-in flash that bounced off the ceiling), it would be much better. I could live with a camera that took nice indoor event shots as well as great outdoor, daytime sports shots. But, given the flash on the unit, that's not the case. The only area where this really excels is in outdoor, daytime photography.

Does that mean the camera is horrible? Absolutely not. When you compare it to a standard point and shoot camera, the P80 is a vast improvement. Even when the Coolpix P80 didn't perform to my expectations, it did much better than my old point and shoot. But, now that I've got a real dSLR and I know what it can do, I can't go back to taking sub-par pictures indoors or at night games.

So, if you're looking to upgrade from a point and shoot but you don't want to invest the money in a dSLR kit, the Nikon Coolpix P80 (and presumably the newer P90) is a good investment. But, if you know you like photography and you can afford the more expensive kit, skip the Coolpix and opt for an entry-level dSLR. They're more expensive, but they're worthy every penny.