Review: PureDigital Flip Video Camera

Review: PureDigital Flip Video Camera, Camcorder Uses Flash Memory

September 2007 By Eric Bass

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The flip video is an inexpensive alternative to a conventional camcorder. Made by Pure Digital, the company that a few years ago introduced a single-use camcorder (shoot your video, drop it off where you bought it and get a DVD back), the Flip uses built-in flash memory rather than tapes, DVD or hard drive. It’s very similar to RCA’s Small Wonder (which is also made by Pure Digital) and several products from Sanyo.

The Flip stores one hour of video on a gigabyte of memory. Resolution is 640 x 480 at 30fps, which technically is the same as standard NTSC video or standard definition television. You can’t change the quality settings to get more video on the camera, nor is there an option for adding a flash card, but an hour seems sufficient for this camera.

Shooting is essentially a one-button affair. There’s a small LCD screen on the back and a big red button for recording. You also get a zoom control, but it’s not an actual optical zoom, so I recommend you avoid using it. There’s no picture menu for controlling things like gain or exposure and no focus control. It’s a fixed focus, like what you get on a disposable film camera.

Video saves in MPEG4 as an AVI file which is easily compatible with most video editing software, but the really cool thing about the Flip is that video editing and sharing software is included on the camera. The Flip has a built-in flip-out USB jack for connecting it to a computer. Once plugged in, the imbedded software automatically launches and stays on the camera—you don’t have to save an application on your PC, so you can use it anywhere, on any PC.

The software is really the key to this product. It’s dirt simple. Video editing doesn’t involve story line or time line modes or any complicated instructions. View, save, share––that’s about it. You can trim individual clips, combine clips into larger movies and save them to your hard drive. There’s a simple application for e-mailing videos as well. If you’re a Youtube or Grouper user then this cam is perfect for you. The software will automatically launch either one of those video sharing Web sites and prepare your clips for upload. This process is very easy. I put several videos online within five minutes of shooting them.

You can also use the software to burn your videos onto a DVD. While this process is also easy, it didn’t always work for me. The application locked up several times during my attempts. I found it easier to save my movies to the PC’s hard drive then use Nero to burn my DVD.

How’s the video look? For a $150 video camera, it looks pretty good. If you’re watching it on a TV it won’t measure up to what you get from a DV camcorder. The image is grainier than a DV cam, and sometimes the video is a little out of sync, but it’s not too bad, and is a lot of fun to use.

Now if you’ve purchased a digital still camera within the last year or two you may already have the ability to shoot equivalent videos. Most new still cameras contain an MPEG4 video function, and most offer frame rate and resolution options. What may make this more compelling for you is the built-in memory and built-in software. If you’ve never edited, e-mailed or uploaded a video file, but want to, this camera takes the confusion out of it. For short online videos it’s perfect. I like it for its portability and ease of use.

This summer, E-Gear editor Grant Clauser tested the Flip Video. See the video on E-Gear.com here.