Leaked info about a new dSLR stole a bit of Nikon's thunder this morning, but the company officially announced the D60 digital SLR this evening. (The price was announced later at $750.)

So far, the D60 is one of the hottest camera announcements of PMA 2008 in Las Vegas, the annual photography industry show that begins on Wednesday.

According to Nikon's press release, the D60 is smaller than your average dSLR, just like the popular Nikon D40. The 10.2-megapixel cam comes with the AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G VR image-stabilizing lens included.

Thanks to a few nifty features on the D60, this dSLR acts like it's a point-and-shoot, making it seem like a good option for first-time dSLR buyers.

It's practically an instant-on camera, with an 0.18-second startup time. Users can crop, retouch, and edit photos in the camera with its onboard editing apps, and the camera can even create stop-motion films by sequencing up to 100 consecutive shots. Nikon says the Stop Motion Movie mode is a first for dSLRs.

Another interesting feature is the camera's dust-removal system; it literally shakes dust off the lens and has something called an Airflow Control System that blows dust particles away from the CCD sensor.

The D60 uses Nikon's Expeed imaging processing engine to enhance photo color and tone, as well as 3-D Color Matrix Metering II, which the company says makes automatic exposure adjustments to low-light shots. The camera can capture RAW-format images, which can be resized and edited within the camera.

In addition to SD cards, the D60 also supports two of the emerging trends of this year's CES and PMA shows: Eye-Fi cards and high-capacity SDHC cards. The Eye-Fi card can transmit images directly from the camera to a computer over a Wi-Fi connection, eliminating the need for a USB cable. SDHC cards made a big splash at CES this year when their capacity hit 32GB -- all that storage is handy if you're shooting in RAW format all the time.

No pricing information for the D60 has been announced just yet, but Nikon says the new dSLR will be available in February.

PC World Senior Products Editor Melissa Perenson contributed to this story.