Today's guest post is from Lisa Hendey of Productivity at Home.

I was fortunate enough to receive a complimentary Flip Video Ultra Series Camcorder
for review from Amazon, who offered the product to frequent reviewers
to promote their new Video Review feature. Since receiving the Flip Video
a week ago, our family has had a blast playing with this diminutive
little camera. Like most other families, we own a regular sized video
camera that gets pulled out for the occasional school play, Christmas,
or major trip. So I wasn't convinced that we would actually use the Flip Video very much.

Wrong! Since owning the camera, we've shot over thirty video clips
in a variety of lighting and sound situations. The biggest fans of the
camera, of course, are my teenage sons who are a part of the You Tube
generation. They love the immediate gratification of being able to
shoot a video, flip the USB arm from the side of the camera, plug it
into the computer, and use the camera's on board software to upload
directly to You Tube in one step.

Here's the blueprint for the Flip Video:
the dimensions are 1.2 x 2.2 x 4.2 inches and the camera weighs 7.2
ounces, less than my cell phone. I have a small camera bag, and this
little guy fits neatly into it with my still camera, making it easy and
accessible - which means that you will actually carry it along on
outings. It would easily fit into a pocket. The camera comes with a
hand strap and small drawstring bag (not too useful). With 2 GB of
memory, the camera can hold up to sixty minutes of footage. All the
software you need is loaded onto the camera, which enables you to do
some minor editing, file organization, upload clips to the web, or
email, and string clips together to make a longer movie. The Flip Video also comes with a cord to connect to the television and watch videos there, but we have not as yet tested that feature.

On the down side, the Flip Video
is not the perfect camera for taking far away videos, since it only has
a 2x zoom level. I found that it is great for shooting at close range,
but when I tried to shoot video from a great distance (as you might do
at a school play or sporting event), the results were not great.

I'm looking forward to using the Flip Video
to capture those "spur of the moment" situations with my kids that seem
to come up in day to day life (like the following video of my son Eric
playing music with some friends recently). Since the camera is so
small and light, it easily fits into my small purse and is ready at a
moment's notice. We've had a great time playing with the Flip Video and would highly recommend it for families on the go like ours, looking to capture memories without a lot of hassle. Have fun!