About the Nikon Coolpix B500
Zoom in on faraway details
The built-in telephoto lens on the Nikon Coolpix B500 gets you 40X closer to the action.
Zoom in on faraway details
Don't miss it when your daughter scores a goal on the other end of the field from where you're sitting. The Nikon Coolpix B500 is ready for the moment, with a powerful 40X zoom lens built into a compact body. Sure, she's dribbling through the defense quickly, but the camera locks in with target-finding autofocus and subject tracking so you can keep the focus right where it belongs. Optical vibration reduction keeps those little tremors from sneaking in and blurring the image when you don't have time to grab your tripod.
Shoot in natural light
Bright daylight is easy to shoot in. But what do you do when you're in a dimly lit ballroom or photographing city streets at night? The B500's 16-megapixel image sensor works well in low light situations, allowing you to retain the warm, romantic quality of the existing light without using a flash. Then, if you're switching to a portrait in the same environment, you can employ the built-in flash to add a little brightness to your subject's face when you need it.
Stay connected
The B500 is equipped with Wi-Fi and NFC, so you can quickly share photos and videos online, and touch-pair the camera with compatible mobile devices. Better yet, built-in Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) lets you establish a constant connection with your compatible smartphone for instant photo sharing and remote camera control.
Product highlights:
Specifications:
- 16-megapixel effective recording CMOS sensor
- 40X optical zoom
- 3" high-resolution LCD screen (921,000 dots)
- built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE)
- NFC touch-pairing with compatible Android™ devices
- records photos and video onto optional SD, SDHC, or SDXC memory cards
- 35mm equivalent focal length: 22.5-900mm
Special Features:
- optical image stabilization with vibration reduction for blur-free photos
- high-definition movie mode (up to 1080p resolution)
- continuous shooting captures up to 7 shots at 7.4 frames per second at full resolution
- Subject Tracking auto focus helps you stay locked on subjects as they move
- face priority autofocus, red-eye fix and Glamour Retouch for improved portraits
- built-in pop-up flash
Connections and Dimensions:
- micro HDMI output (cable not included)
- high-speed USB interface
- A/V output
- 4-1/2"W x 3-1/8"H x 3-13/16"D
- weight (with battery and memory card): 19.1 ounces
- warranty: 1 year parts and labor
Supplied Accessories:
- 4 "AA" batteries
- USB cable
- neck strap
- lens cap
- MFR # 26508
What's in the box:
Nikon Coolpix B500 owner's manual
- Digital camera (red)
- LC-CP31 Front lens cap
- Lens cap string
- Neck strap
- 4 "AA" alkaline batteries
- 24" USB cable (Type A USB on one end and a proprietary plug on other end)
- Quick Start Guide
- Warranty Programs card
- Notes about inserting a plug
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More details on the Nikon Coolpix B500
Features & specs
General | ||
---|---|---|
LCD Screen Size | 3" | |
Adjustable-angle LCD | Yes | |
Wi-Fi | Built-in | |
Touchscreen | No | |
Waterproof | No | |
GPS-enabled | No | |
Lens 35mm Equivalent | 22.5-900mm | |
Optical Zoom | 40x | |
Digital Zoom | 4x | |
Filter Diameter | N | |
Manual Focusing | No | |
Manual Exposure | No | |
Built-in Flash | Yes | |
HDMI Output | Micro | |
Memory | ||
Internal Memory | 20MB | |
Memory Stick | No | |
CFexpress Cards | No | |
CompactFlash Cards | No | |
SD Cards | SD, SDHC, SDXC | |
XQD Cards | No | |
Image | ||
Sensor Size | 1/2.3" | |
Megapixels | 16 | |
Image Stabilization | Optical + Digital | |
Highest Resolution | 4608 x 3456 | |
4K Video | No | |
Video Resolution | 1920 x 1080 | |
Dimensions | ||
Width (inches) | 4-1/2 | |
Height (inches) | 3-1/8 | |
Depth (inches) | 3-3/4 | |
Weight With Battery (ounces) | 19.2 | |
Warranty | ||
Parts Warranty | 1 Year | |
Labor Warranty | 1 Year |
Product Research
Recording Features
Play, Edit and Print Functions
Battery Information
Inputs and Outputs Notes
Software
Recording Features
Overview: The Nikon Coolpix B500 is an advanced digital camera with a long 40x optical zoom. You can take beautiful 16MP photos or Full HD video using the flip-up 3" LCD. The camera has Lens-Shift Vibration Reduction for blur-free shots while zoomed in. The B500 features Wi-Fi and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) that lets you share your photos instantly or for remote camera control. The camera comes with 4 "AA" alkaline batteries, a USB cable, and a fabric neck strap.
3" Flip-up LCD Monitor: The camera has a 3" high resolution LCD monitor featuring approximately 921,000 dots, an anti-reflection coating and a five-level brightness adjustment. The LCD monitor has approximately 99% horizontal and vertical coverage in both shooting and playback modes. You can tilt the monitor approximately 85° downward for high-angle shots, and approximately 90° upward for low-angle shots. The B500 does not have a separate viewfinder.
Image Sensor: The Coolpix B500 features a 1/2.3" CMOS image sensor with approximately 16.76-million total pixels and 16.0-million effective pixels.
Recording Media: Images can be recorded onto SD, SDHC, or SDXC Memory cards. When an SD Memory card is inserted in the camera, the images are automatically recorded onto the card. When no card is inserted, the images automatically record to the 20 MB internal memory. The camera can support SD, SDHC, and SDXC cards.
Optics: The Coolpix B500 digital camera uses a Zoom-NIKKOR ED glass lens for superb image quality. Every aspect of the lens manufacturing process is controlled by Nikon. The Zoom-NIKKOR ED lens is designed for the specific camera and image sensor combination. The lens has a 40x optical zoom, and a focal length of 4.0-160mm that is equivalent to a 22.5-900mm lens in 35mm photography. Coupled with the 4x digital zoom, the camera's total zoom capability is 160x. The angle of view is equivalent up to a 3600mm lens (35mm format).
Vibration Reduction: The Coolpix B500 offers Lens-shift Vibration Reduction (VR) image stabilization to reduce blurring caused by camera shake when shooting, especially at telephoto zoom positions or slow shutter speeds. When recording video, a 4-axis Hybrid VR helps smooth out up/down, left/right, in/out, and tilting movements.
File Formats: The Coolpix B500 records still images in JPEG format. HD and SD movies are recorded in MOV format (Video: MPEG-4 AVC/H.264, Audio: AAC stereo). There are eight still image size options and six movie options:
- Still Images:
- 16M: 4608 x 3456 (1:4 or 1:8 compression)
- 8M: 3264 x 2448 (1:8 compression)
- 4M: 2272 x 1704
- 2M: 1600 x 1200
- VGA: 640 x 480
- 16:9 12M: 4608 x 2592
- 1:1: 3456 x 3456
- Movies:
- HD 1080/30p: 1920 x 1080 (30 fps)
- HD 1080/60i: 1920 x 1080 (60 fps)
- HD 720p: 1280 x 720 (30 fps)
- VGA: 640 x 480 (30 fps)
- HS Movies:
- HS 1080/0.5x (1920 x 1080): 2x speed fast motion playback (record up to 2 min; playback 1 min); no sound
- HS 480/4x (640 x 480): 1/4x speed slow motion playback (record up to 15 sec; playback 1 min); no sound
SnapBridge: SnapBridge is a new wireless connection innovation from Nikon that lets you transfer photos, even while shooting, upload photos to the Nikon Image Space cloud service, and remotely control the camera from your smartphone. SnapBridge utilizes a Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) connection between the camera and the smart device. Devices with Near-Field Communication (NFC) can launch the SnapBridge app by touching the device to the camera's N-mark. A one-time setup is required to register the camera with the app, and thereafter, an automatic connection is made between the two devices. SnapBridge will let you imprint up to two pieces of credit information, such as copyright, comments, text, or logos, onto your pictures. You can receive firmware updates for your camera, and update the camera's date, time, and location info through your smart device. The SnapBridge app is currently available for Android (5.0 and up) on Google Play, and for iOS (6.0.1 or later) on the iTunes App Store.
Built-in Wi-Fi: In addition to SnapBridge, the Coolpix B500 has built-in Wi-Fi, which allows you to connect the camera with your smartphone or tablet. Through the wireless connection (IEEE 802.11b/g), you can upload photos and videos from your camera to your device. It is recommended that a Wi-Fi connection is used for large volume uploads. Once you have loaded the images to your smartphone, you can share them via email, texts, or social networking sites.
Shooting Modes: Using the top-mounted Mode Dial, you can choose one of the following shooting modes:
- Auto Mode: This is an automatic "point-and-shoot" mode recommended for first-time users of digital cameras. Available functions in the Auto Mode include: Creative slider, Flash mode, Self-timer, Macro Mode, and Shooting Menu.
- Scene Auto Selector: In the Scene Auto Selector mode, the camera automatically recognizes the shooting conditions when you frame a picture. Shooting scenes include: Portrait (1-2 persons), Portrait (large group of people), Landscape, Night Portrait (1-2 persons), Night Portrait (large group of people), Night Landscape, Close-up, Backlighting (for subjects other than people), Backlighting (for taking portraits), and Other.
- Scene Mode: You can manually or automatically select one of 15 scene modes with settings optimized for the shooting situation. Available scene modes include: Portrait, Landscape, Multiple Exposure Lighten, Party/indoor, Beach, Snow, Sunset, Dusk/dawn, Close-up, Food, Fireworks show, Easy Panorama, Pet portrait, Moon, and Birdwatching.
- Night Landscape:
- Night Portrait:
- Backlighting:
- Sports:
- Creative Mode: The camera simultaneously saves four images with effects and one image without effects. You can select the following effects: Variety, Selective Color (Red), Selective Color (Green), Selective Color (Blue), Light, Depth, Memory, Classic, and Noir.
- Smart Portrait: You can take a picture with a glamour retouch function to enhance human faces. You can apply skin softening, foundation makeup, soft, vividness, and brightness effects.
- Short Movie Show: The camera creates a short 1920 x 1080/30p movie that is up to 30 seconds long by recording and automatically combining multiple movie clips that are several seconds long.
Continuous Shooting: In the Continuous Shooting mode, you can select in the menu from the following single or continuous shooting options:
- Single: One image is shot each time the shutter-release button is pressed.
- Continuous H: Up to 7 pictures are shot at a rate of about 7.7 frames per second each time the shutter button is held down. Image size is set to 16M: 4608 x 3456 pixels.
- Continuous L: Up to 7 pictures are shot at a rate of about 2 frame per second each time the shutter button is held down. Image size is set to 16M: 4608 x 3456 pixels.
- Pre-shooting Cache: To avoid missing a shot, the pre-shooting cache begins when the shutter-release button is pressed halfway, and continues when the button is pressed all the way. Frame rate is up to 15 fps. Up to 25 frames are captured, including up to 4 frames captured in the pre-shooting cache. Image size is fixed at 2M: 1600 x 1200.
- Continuous H 120 fps: Each time the shutter-release button, 50 frames are captured at a speed of about 120 fps. Image size is fixed at VGA 640 x 480.
- Continuous H 60 fps: Each time the shutter-release button, 25 frames are captured at a speed of about 60 fps. Image size is fixed at 1M 1280 x 960.
- Best Shot Selector: Camera captures up to 10 images while the shutter release is held down, and the sharpest image in the series is selected and saved.
Self-timer: The camera is equipped with a 10 second, 5 second, and 2 second timer for self-portraits. In addition, the camera can use face detection to detect human faces, and automatically release the shutter when a smile is detected (Smile Timer).
AF Area Mode: You can select between the following AF Area Modes to determine how the camera selects the focus area for Auto Focus:
- Face Priority: When the camera recognizes a face (front view only), the camera will focus on the face automatically.
- Manual: You can manually select one of up to 99 focus areas in the monitor. This method is handy when the intended subject is not positioned in the center of the frame, and is relatively still. You can choose spot, normal, or wide to change the size of the movable focus area.
- Center: The camera focuses on the subject in the center of the frame.
- Subject Tracking: Once you select a subject to focus on, the focus area will move and follow the subject.
- Target Finding AF: The camera will adjust the focus on what it determines to be the main subject. If no main subject is detected, it automatically selects the subject closest to the camera as the subject.
AF Modes: When shooting still images or movies you can choose between the following auto-focus modes:
- Single AF: The camera focuses when the shutter-release button is pressed halfway and locks at this position during recording.
- Full-time AF: The camera constantly adjusts focus, even when the shutter-release button is not pressed.
- Pre-focus AF: The camera focuses when subject movement is detected, or the image composition is significantly changed, even if the shutter release button is not pressed halfway.
AF-Assist Illuminator: If lighting is poor, the AF-assist illuminator may light to assist the focus operation when the shutter-release button is pressed halfway. The illuminator has a range of about 6.5' at the maximum wide-angle position and 5'-2" at the maximum telephoto position. You can turn this function on or off.
Blink Proof: The Blink Proof function is available when you are shooting in Smart Portrait mode. The camera automatically releases the shutter twice with every shot and saves one image in which the subject's eyes are open. This function can be turned on/off in the menu.
Exposure Compensation: You can alter the exposure from the value suggested by the camera, making pictures brighter or darker. You can adjust the exposure from -2.0 to +2.0 EV in 1/3 EV steps, using the multi-selector on the back of the camera.
ISO Settings: Sensitivity is the measure of how quickly the camera reacts to light. The higher the sensitivity, the less light needed to make an exposure. The camera features the following ISO settings:
- Auto: Sensitivity is set to ISO 125 when there is sufficient lighting, and raises the sensitivity to a maximum of ISO 1600 when lighting is dim.
- Fixed Range Auto: Select from two ranges in which the camera automatically sets the sensitivity: ISO 125-400 or ISO 80-800.
- Manual: Sensitivity is locked at the set value: ISO 125, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200, and 6400.
White Balance: You can set the White Balance to Auto, Daylight, Incandescent, Fluorescent, Cloudy, or Flash. You can also choose Preset Manual and use a neutral-colored object as a reference to set the white balance under unusual lighting conditions.
Built-in Flash: The Coolpix B500 has a built-in pop-up flash with a range of 1'-8" to 22' (Wide angle) and 11' (Telephoto). You can choose from the following flash modes:
- Auto: Flash fires automatically when lighting is poor.
- Auto with Red-eye Reduction: Pre-flash fires before main flash to reduce red-eye effect.
- Fill Flash: Flash will fire whenever a picture is taken.
- Slow Sync: Auto flash combined with slow shutter speeds.
Play, Edit and Print Functions
Slide Show Playback: View pictures in the internal memory or on the memory card in an automatic slide show with 2, 3, 5, or 10 seconds between pictures. If desired, you can loop the slideshow so it will continuously play. Maximum slide show duration is 30 minutes without operation.
Thumbnail Playback: During playback, you can view multiple thumbnail images (4, 9, or 16) at a time. While these "contact sheets" are displayed, you can use the multi-selector to highlight individual pictures. Highlighted pictures can be deleted, if desired.
Calendar Display: This feature displays a calendar allowing you to select and view pictures taken on the same date.
Playback Zoom: During playback, you can enlarge a still image up to 10x. Once the image is zoomed, you can use the multi-selector to scroll around to non-visible portions of the image. You can record a new picture of the cropped image by pressing the shutter button.
Rotate Image: Recorded pictures can be rotated 90-degrees clockwise or counter-clockwise on the unit's LCD screen.
Editing Picture: You can use the Coolpix B500 to edit recorded pictures in-camera and store them as separate files. An image can be edited up to 10 times. You can choose from the following editing functions:
- Quick Effects: You can process images with a variety of effects. You can select Painting, Photo Illustration, Soft Portrait, Background Monochrome Portrait, Fisheye, Cross Screen, and Miniature Effect.
- Quick Retouch: Quick Retouch can be used to easily create retouched copies in which contrast and saturation have been enhanced.
- D-Lighting: D-Lighting can be used to brighten dark or backlit subjects. While playing back an image, you can select the D-Lighting function, apply it, and save the corrected image without harming the properly exposed areas of the image.
- Red-eye Correction: You can apply correction to images in which red-eye is detected.
- Glamour Retouch: The camera recognizes faces in pictures and creates a copy with softer facial skin tones. Other effects include glare reduction, whiten teeth, lipstick, redden cheeks, and various effects for the eyes.
- Resizing Pictures (Small Picture): You can create a small copy of a recorded image. The copy will be stored as a JPEG file with a compression ratio of 1:8. You can choose from the following sizes: 640 x 480 (suited to television playback), 320 x 240 (suited to display on web pages), or 160 x 120 (suitable for email attachments).
- Crop: Creates a copy containing only a portion visible on the monitor.
Multi-Language Menu: You can choose from 36 different menu display languages including English, Spanish and French.
Printing Pictures: You can print pictures stored in the internal memory or on the memory card by using the Print Set option in the playback menu. Using DPOF (Digital Print Order Form), you can designate which images to print, and how many copies to print. Pictures can be printed as followed:
- Printer or Photo Lab: insert the memory card into a printer, or take the memory card to a digital photo lab (images stored in the internal memory need to be transferred to a memory card prior to printing).
- PictBridge-compatible Printer: connect the camera to a PictBridge-compatible printer via USB cable
- Transferring to Computer: transfer the images to a computer before printing them via USB
Battery Information
Power Requirements: The Coolpix B500 is powered by four "AA" batteries. Alkaline batteries are included with the camera, however, you can use Lithium or Ni-MH rechargeable batteries. An optional AC adapter (EH-67 or EH67s) is available for powering the camera from ordinary household current. Battery life estimates are as follows:
Battery Type | Still Images | Movie Recording |
---|---|---|
Alkaline | 600 shots | 1 hr 30 min |
Lithium | 1240 shots | 4 hrs 30 min |
EN-MH2 (Ni-MH) | 750 shots | 2 hrs 35 min |
Auto Off: If no operations are performed for about one minute, the screen turns off, the camera enters standby mode, and the power-on light flashes. After remaining in standby mode for three minutes, the camera will turn itself off.
Inputs and Outputs Notes
HDMI: The Coolpix B500 is equipped with a micro-HDMI (Type D) output, allowing you to connect the camera to an HDTV. An optional micro-HDMI-to-HDMI cable is required.
USB Port: The camera features a proprietary USB port on the side of the camera for connecting the supplied USB cable (UC-E16) to download your photos to your computer or PictBridge-compatible printer. The USB interface is USB 2.0 Hi-Speed compatible.
DC Input: A DC input connector is provided for plugging in the optional EH-67 or EH-67s AC adapter. This allows you to operate the camera on ordinary household current while printing images from the camera, uploading large numbers of files to your computer, or playing back images during a slide show.
Software
ViewNX-i Software: Nikon ViewNX-i is free software that can be used with the Coolpix B500 for transferring images and movies from the camera to your computer for viewing and editing. It can be downloaded from the Nikon Download Center (URL is in the included Quick Start Guide.)
System Requirements: The ViewNX-i software will work with the following Operating Systems:
- Windows: Windows 10 (Home, Pro, Enterprise), Windows 8.1 (Pro, Enterprise), Windows 7 (Home Basic, Home Premium SP1, Professional SP1, Enterprise SP1, Ultimate SP1)
- Mac: OS X 10.11.3, OS X 10.10.5, OS X 10.9.5
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I bought this camera to take kayaking for nature photography. I didn't want to bring my expensive Nikon and lens. I am really pleased with the results. I often take it with me when I don't want to lug around a heavy 500 MM lens. I particularly like the flexible, bright view finder.
Joseph from Allison Park, PA