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Nikon D5100 Guide:
Playback Menu
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Nikon D5100

Nikon D5100 and 35mm f/1.8 DX lens. enlarge. This free website's biggest source of support is when you use these links, especially these directly to the D5100 at Adorama, Amazon or Ritz (body-only) or these to Adorama, Amazon or Ritz (kit with lens) when you get anything, regardless of the country in which you live. Thank you! Ken.

 

October 2011      Top of Nikon D5100 User's Guide     Nikon D5100 Review

NEW: Nikon D5100 User's Guide App 12 October 2011

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Free Live Help (USA only)       top

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In the USA, call (800) NIKON-UX, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

 

How to get to the PLAYBACK Menu

Press MENU, click to the left and then up to select the top "[ > ] " (play) icon. You'll then see PLAYBACK MENU at the top of the color LCD.

 

What it Does

It sets a few playback options.

 

What I Change

I use this menu to activate the RGB histogram.

 

 

MENU ITEMS:        top

 

Delete

This is helpful if you want to delete all images, while saving those you locked with the Key / AE-L AF-L button.

I don't use this. I do all my editing and selection in my computer and I do my in-camera deletions one-by-one with the trash can key.

 

Playback Folder       top

The camera can record to and play back from different folders.

ALL shows you everything on the card. I leave my D5100 set to ALL. It tends to reset itself to Current, meaning it won't play images made on a different camera if they are on your card.

CURRENT ignores photos in folders other than the one to which you're recording. This means it won't see images recorded on different cameras, and if you're a smarty-pants who makes new folders in your D5100, it will only play from the current folder.

 

Playback Display Options       top

This lets you activate certain playback information screens.

They are all off by default. To set any of them to display, press:

MENU > PLAYBACK > Playback display mode (go down and check any you want) > Done > OK.

If you forget to go back up to select Done and then to hit OK, the D5100 ignores you! I'm serious; if you think this isn't working on your camera, you forgot both to select DONE and then to select OK.

Once activated, you move through these screens by pressing the up or down buttons while playing an image.

 

Your choices are:

None (image only)

This option displays your picture only. It's a clean, unadulterated display.

 

Highlights

An annoying display where overly bright parts of the image blink.

 

RGB HIstogram

I use this. It's the only useful form of histogram. More at RGB histograms.

 

Shooting Data

Adds three pages of playback data.

If you want to know minor details like how much sharpening you used, this is how you get it all to display.

 

Overview

A screen with a small image, a B&W histogram and a whole bunch of other data.

 

Image Review       top

ON makes the picture appear right after you take it.

OFF makes the screen stay blank unless you press PLAY.

 

Rotate Tall        top

This is Japanese for rotating the vertical shots on playback.

It doesn't affect your images or files; it only changes how they are displayed on the D5100.

 

Slide Show        top

This lets you amaze your friends with an exciting slide show on the tiny screen.

I don't bother with this. I guess it's popular in Japan. Whoo hoo! Let's all watch a show on a 3" screen!

You can plug your D5100 directly into a TV, HDTV or video projector. If you do, use the HDMI output.

Using the A/V output will look bad because video resolution is so bad that everything will look awful.

 

DPOF print order        top

I never use this. I guess it's popular in Japan.

This lets you mark images for printing if you sorted and then printed directly from your D5100, and had a lab which could read this data.

 

back to top of page     back to top of Nikon D5100 User's Guide

 

KNOBS, BUTTONS and CONTROLS

MENUS

     PLAYBACK MENU  

     SHOOTING MENU < NEXT

     CUSTOM SETTING MENU

     SETUP MENU

     RETOUCH MENU

     RECENT ITEMS MENU

 

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