Photos taken at high ISO values from Nikon’s new D7000 prosumer camera are starting to show up on the web. ISO 6400 is amazing, and the shots at ISO 25,600 don’t even look all that bad. This means that $1,200 USD buys you a camera that rivals the ISO performance of everything Nikon makes, other than the D3 series and possibly the D700. Those cameras are $2,400 and $4,000+ at the moment, and represent Nikon’s professional lineup of DSLR bodies.

The D7000 also has a higher megapixel count than everything other than the [$7,399 D3x][3].

Which means whatever Nikon releases to replace the D700 is should be amazing. And it’s getting really hard to wait for The Next Big Thing, when the New Big Thing looks pretty damn tasty. I’m sure there’s professional features on my D200 that are lacking in the D7000 (like the intervalometer), but the D200 (my current camera) tops out at ISO 1600, and looks pretty bad doing it.

[3]: The shots at ISO 25,600 don’t even look all that bad.