Point & Shoot

Nikon Coolpix B700 Review and 4K Video Zoom Test



Today I’m looking at the Nikon Coolpix B700 Superzoom camera. The Nikon Coolpix B700 is meant to be a Bridge camera that is designed for people who want something that’s much better than a smartphone or point-n-shoot, but aren’t ready to step up to a DSLR or mirrorless. It also has 4K video capability, so it could also pretty easily replace the family camcorder. More about the 4K video in a minute.The Nikon Coolpix B700 is a nice, chunky camera with a very deep rubberized grip. The combination of the deep rubberized grip and good balance make it pretty easy to hold and use, even with one hand. Its body is made entirely of black matte plastic and seems pretty ruggedly built.

It has a 60x nikkor powerzoom lens on the front and I’ll show you how the zoom performs in a minute. Now the powerzoom can be operated either using the zoom toggle built around the shutter button or the zoom button on the side of the lens. I actually prefer the shutter toggle, as it seems to keep the camera steadier when zooming. The top also has the on-off button and a mode selector dial. The popup flash is also built into this surface and has a pair of stereo microphones on top of it. I like that they have the video record button positioned so that you can hit record very easily.

And like DSLRs it has a built-in adjuster dial, since the Nikon B700 also allows you change shutter speed, aperture and iso manually. And the other buttons on the back are also pretty reminiscent of a DSLR. And this doesn’t mean its complicated to use, just that the buttons are laid out like on a DSLR. Now one of the nicest features on the Nikon B700 is the flippable 3.0 inch articulating screen, which is great for taking selfies and more importantly vlogging. And the quality of the screen is very good- it’s very sharp and bright enough to use outdoors, which is where this camera is mostly going to be used. The only issue with the screen is that it isn’t a touchscreen. It would have been nice to have the ability to touch to focus or specify your focus area.

It’s not a huge issue but definitely something I missed. The Nikon B700 also has an electronic viewfinder. The viewfinder is decent. Probably not the sharpest viewfinder on the market, but more than adequate for taking photos. The viewfinder also has a built in eye sensor that senses your eyes and automatically switches from the screen to the viewfinder. Pull away and it switches back automatically. The Nikon Coolpix B700 is powered by an EL23 battery pack that lives in this compartment on the bottom, with the SD card. What I don’t like about NIkon’s base kit is that it doesn’t come with a standalone wall battery charger.

Instead they provide a USB cable and wall adapter so you have to plug into the camera to charge it. I really recommend getting a standalone charger so you can swap batteries out. And the battery life isn’t fantastic, so I’d definitely recommend buying a few spares. I’ll leave links to both the charger and batteries below. The Nikon Coolpix B700 can also be mounted to tripods with a ¼-20 tripod thread. And just a quick note about the SD cards it can use. You’ll need use an SD card with a UHS class 3 rating, if you plan to record 4K video. I’ll leave a link to one that’ll work, below this video.

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