Flip UltraHD Camcorder, 120 Minutes (Black)

The Flip is a pint-sized camcorder with a surprising feature set given its compactness. Though is it not a full-featured camcorder and I would not recommend it for serious recording (special events or production material), it is excellent for on-the-go shots and for spontaneous recording when opportunities present themselves.

The Flip is small - a little smaller than an ice cream sandwich. It may be little, but there's tremendous convenience in being able to drop your camcorder in your shirt pocket or your purse and have it at the ready. This compact size holds everything you need to start recording - batteries, flash RAM and all. Without tapes or DVD media on which to record, there's little reason for this device to be any bigger.

It is a solid little thing and feels durable. That doesn't mean it would do well if dropped or stepped on, but it likely will be ok if jostled a little.

Recording is simple. No, I should be more clear - recording with the Flip is trivial. There is no real science to using it: turn it on, point and press record. Press the record button again to stop recording. Even technological novices, or people afraid of electronics will have no trouble using the Flip to record. Playing back is equally simple - once the recording is finished, press the Play button.

There are + and - buttons, used for Zoom. The Flip doesn't have a particularly capable zoom, so shooting from a distance will not yield especially great results.

I tested this camcorder in my basement on a bright, sunny day, and I wandered about recording and chattering to myself. When I played back what I had recorded, I made a pleasant discovery - it does some light balancing and deals with changes in light levels so that the video is still clear. The sound is also good, better than I expected. When I walked down a dark hallway and into an unlit room, it had tried very hard to accommodate for the lack of light but it was unable to completely overcome the darkness. As there is no light on the camcorder to come on when it is dark, this is understandable, but it did surprisingly well in spite of that.

I attached the Flip to my computer to pull the video to my hard drive. FlipShare installed itself and started up, seeing the video I had made. It allowed me to pull it over and even gave me the option to delete it from the camera. Once finished, I was able to play the video through FlipShare. Instead, I decided to hunt it down and use a different application to play it.

I found the file and tried to open it with Windows Media Player. I got audio, but not video. When I switched to QuickTime, my video came up and filled my screen. This is the point at which I made an unfortunate discovery. Every minute move I had made while recording was now plainly obvious, as there is no anti-jitter built into the device.

The video, on a 1440x900 resolution screen, looked clear. It records at 1280x720, which is not that much smaller, so I was a little surprised. I would have expected a little pixelation, but this actually was not an issue.

There are few settings that can be adjusted on the Flip - language, date, time and recording light.

The Flip is a nice camcorder that provides tremendous convenience and fun. It is very easy to use and very compact. It is important to remember that it has some limitations which make it a less-than-ideal choice for more serious application, but if those limitations are not an issue for you then the Flip is a fun and affordable way to capture things on video.Get more detail about Flip UltraHD Camcorder, 120 Minutes (Black).