Flip Video Camera.

Well as some of you know, I have been excited about getting my birthday (which is Dec. 6) present, a Flip Video camcorder. And after much pleading, I managed to receive it early.


First of all, let me say that I love it. It wonderful. The idea and premise behind this thing was simply ingenious. To have a small, easy to use camcorder that is also simple to use, is like Prometheus giving fire. It has good video resolution, granted its not great, and when played on the full screen view on Youtube, it does look a little pixely. However when played on the standard Youtube viewing size, it looks wonderful. These videos are stored on a built in 2 or 1 gig flash drive, which elimintates the need for buying SD cards, as an AVI file (which for those who don't know, is the standard file for videos for all Windows systems, and can be watched on almost all major media viewing software, and more importantly, is easily converted into other formats for ipods and psps).

The camera itself is a nice size, large enough to be sturdy, but no overwhelmingly clunky. It is about the size of an ipod, but around two and a half times a fat. It does however, seem very light to the touch. The Ultra series comes in five colors, orange, pink, green, black, and white.(Mine is white with the silver inlay) and asides from its relativity large thickness, is quite ascetically appealing. The front is slightly parabolic, and very shiny (which worries me about scratches); while the back is flat, with a 2 inch screen, 3 buttons( on/off, play,delete), and a 4 way navigation (up, down, right, left) button. The screen is hard to view in bright light conditions, which is to be expected, but still, being able to show off your videos in broad daylight would be nice. There is no on-screen menu, simply turn on, and choose to record now, or press "play" to scroll and watch your saved movies. The coolest thing, and the reason for its name, is the flip out usb adapter. When you move the slider that holds the arm in place down, the usb adapter springs up perpendicularly to give it somewhat of a "L" appearance.


The Flip comes with built in software, and is plug-and-play compatiable for xp users. All you have to do is plug in the usb adapter and after a quick, one time hardware install, you are shown the on board video editing software. All of this takes about 10 seconds. The video editing software itself is subpar, you can't really do much with it except for save, take snapshots of videos, and add music. The only real shining light of the software is the one-click uploading to Youtube, AOL video, and it even lets you send to private email address. Just choose what movie you want to upload, (you can do multiple at the same time) the choose how you want to share your media, then click upload. Done. Finished. Click and walk away. Granted this does take a little longer than saving the file to your hard drive than uploading to Youtube from the site, but is much, much, much easier. You can even send via emails, which Pure Digital has crafted wonderfully. Instead of sending your video as an attachment, they upload your video to one of their servers, then send your recipients a hyper link to the address. This saves time, and sidesteps the maximum file size that most email providers inflict.


Overall, I give it two thumbs up. Asides from minor flaws, such as video quality (which i must again must say is okay, just not as good as what is available on the market from mini-dvd camcorders), the size, and the on board software, the Pure Digital Flip Camcorder is a beacon of hope in this years lacking Christmas market. For around 120 bucks, you can pick up a wonderful gift that keeps on giving, and will certainly be used everyday.

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