I just got my hands on a new portable video camcorder called the Flip Video Ultra Series, made by Pure Digital. First off, I’ve got to say that it’s got some slick packaging—even in the interior; it definitely hyped up my enthusiasm for this product. One thing that struck me as a huge plus to this camcorder was its compact design compared to the heavy, chunky one we have that lasts only 30 minutes with the LCD screen out. This one could fit in your back pocket and be thrown around, though I would not recommend the latter.

Design

Without a doubt, this compact camcorder is not up to Sony standards—not even close. Everything is basically plastic and even the buttons look cheap. The buttons are easy to press and are placed where it makes sense. It’s simple enough, though, and the colour scheme is ultra modern. It has a nice curved shape that fits the palm of your hands well. The exterior case is easily worn down and I can already see marks within the first week and I’ve barely touched it.

Package Contents

This compact camcorder is unique because you can always attach it to a computer with the included USB stick that is neatly attached to its side. It also does not require any software as the software is built-in to the camcorder. The one thing I hated was the mechanism that released it. On my first try I was able to easily release it, but the problem came about when I tried to put it back in. Seems that I didn’t pull the latch down far enough so it just snapped back making it impossible to flip the USB back in. After further trial and error, I finally figured that I had to pull the latch down to the bottom where it would sit there until the USB stick was pushed and the latch would close shut. 

USB Stick

Another thing that struck me as interesting, was the  “Lock/Unlock” switch located at the bottom of the camcorder. At first I thought it would apply to all the buttons, which seemed logical. I tested it, and it turns out that it only applies to the battery case. Now this is another cool thing about the Flip Video Ultra Series, the battery case placement. It took me a good five minutes to figure out where the battery case was and I had to resort to looking at the instructions to figure out where it was. This is a perfect discreet place to put it and makes the design even better. 

Battery Case

Last, but definitely not least is the power button. With all the stupid things I’ve done with this camcorder, I feel even more stupid writing this, but hey, I’m an honest guy, so what the heck. To me, I think it would be common sense to put a symbol beside the power button to tell users that it is infact the power button. When I first pulled down on it, I figured it would do something else, but to my surprise, it turned it on. The great thing is that it takes no less than two seconds to turn on. 

Video Quality

This is where the good times stop in my mind. In all fairness, I would be totally surprised if this machine was built for quality videos. It comes nowhere near that even at close range. If you are more than 5 metres away from the point of interest, forget about shooting the video. This camcorder is made for close ups like birthday parties or stuff like that. Please, do not expect to get good family vacation videos out of this while you are visiting some gorgeous landmark in Europe. The screen is small, but it does its job: fair enough. It displays only the needed information such as the amount of time left and the status of the camcorder. At my company meeting for Junior Achievement, we put together some videos of us packaging our product, from  Xpress’d so if you’d like to take a look at the actual quality then be my guest. If you’d like to buy a customized white t-shirt then just leave a comment or head to the website above.

Find more videos like this on Xpress’d

Don’t expect to get great zoom either because it only has a 2x digital zoom, which is the worst of the two (digital and optical). Optical is by far the best, and even I can notice the difference when I switch from optical to digital zoom on my digital camera. 

The Flip Video Ultra Series provides you with up to 60 minutes of video on its built-in flash memory depending on which size you get. The 1GB holds 30 minutes while the 2GB holds 60 minutes. Both versions of the Flip Video Ultra Series store the video on MPEG-4 at 30 frames per second—perfect for easy transers to your iPod. Some camcorders have the option to switch to a lower quality but I’m glad this doesn’t because the quality is poor to begin with. At least Pure Digital has improved on its last models as the memory has doubled, but the amount of video recording time has stayed the same meaning they’ve actually made the video quality better. 

Overall

Without a doubt, I can say that this product is great for spur of the moment videos that you might not have the chance to capture because you left your true, hardcore camcorder at home. The video quality is not that great but it gets the job done. It’s keeping up with trends by allowing you to upload your videos directly to AOL Video, MySpace, and of course YouTube. They even provide you with a TV connector to watch your videos instantly on your TV (although I don’t see a reason). For $149 USD, it’s a little pricey, yet not expensive enough to make it undesirable. If you feel you have anything to share and any critisicm to this post, please feel free to comment and share your thoughts. 

Package

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