Kodak PlaySport (Zx3) HD Waterproof Pocket Video Camera (Purple)

The media could not be loaded. I purchased this little camera the day before our 7 day Caribbean cruise. We had no time to practice with it before the trip, and we only had time to scan over the instructions. But no practice or instruction was needed, because we found it to be very simple to use. The small size made it so portable that my husband carried it in his pocket most of the time throughout our cruise. He was constantly filming something! The land videos are awesome! But the icing on this cake is the waterproof feature. We took videos of snorkeling in Grand Cayman, in Cozumel, and our swim in a Jamaican river....about an hour of underwater videoing at each place. NO problems with leakage; the camera still works perfectly.The video I have included was taken at Grand Cayman and has not been edited at all, other than to trim it to a shorter version. (I have NO video editing skills at this point.) We've always wanted to show our non-cruising friends and family what we see when we snorkel, and thanks to this camera, now we can! We also love the SOUND of snorkeling on the video! The 8 GB SDHC card I bought with it lasted through our last night of the 7 day cruise. I bought an extra battery, which only had to be changed out one time. We were pleasantly surprised at the life of the battery between charges. (The cheaper MaximalPower battery works just as well as the Kodak one.)The only negatives are that it does not do well in very low light, because there is no flash. It does fine in normal indoor lighting. As expected, the 5 Megapixel still shots are not the quality I get with my 12.1 Mp Canon. But they are nice, candid shots taken in places or situations where I wouldn't want to carry my bigger, heavier camera. Also, my husband tends to move too fast while videoing, which sometimes causes a brief lapse in focus. If you pan slowly (as you should), there is no problem. All things considered, this little camera is a fantastic buy! We love it! I might have to buy a second one for me, because I can't pry this one out of my husband's hand!PS - The Caselogic TBC-312 case is perfect for this camera.

Bought this a few weeks back in preparation for an upcoming whitewater rafting trip. Was originally eying the Flipcam but was concerned with the price and additional cost for waterproof case, etc. Stumbled across the Playsport and could not be happier.Pros:- Very easy to use, my 5 year old nephew spent a great deal of time playing with it- Video quality is excellent at 720 60/fps (never tried another, numerous other reviews state this is the top quality)- underwater works flawlessly, picks up a beautiful picture (also never used the H2O filter because of lots of back and forth between water and air)- all cords included, including HDMICons:- Microphone is muffled and tinny after being in water. Don't expect quality audio coming out of the water.- Battery life is shaky but easily solved by purchasing an extra battery (Amazon has these for $15 or so)- The ArcSoft software is very limited, plan to use other (I use iMovie that came free on my Macbook and it works wonderfully)For the price, there is no greater value. I supplemented my camera with a little carry case that came with two tripods that fit in the mini case(~$30). I also bought a spare battery, memory card, and a floating camera strap (camera will sink without one!) for all under $40. My total expense for all these goodies was less than $200, which is about where you would just be getting started with the Flipcam.If you are waffling, get the Playsport. My brother has the Flip Slide, played with my Playsport and became insanely jealous of the Kodak. Go for it, you will have a blast!EDIT - I stand by everything I said about the camera inthis previous review but it's worth noting that the camera has stopped working. It will not tun on, with or ithout the memory card in. Kodak has asked that I ship thecamera back to hem for service.

I got this camera because it appeared rugged and I wanted it to study my kids golf and baseball techniques. For this purpose it is perfect. It is very small - about the size of an iPhone. I bought a mini tripod with flexible legs and it works perfectly - just put it on the ground or hold it about 10 - 15 feet away. There is a 60 fps mode at 720p that stops the seams on a baseball on a sunny day. You can really analyze at a fine level of detail. It is good at adjusting to dark areas as well. In an indoor batting cage there was some blur of the bat but the exposure was decent.Of course the camera is also waterproof which is really cool. The first thing that we took a video of was the inside of the sink! I am not worried about getting it wet at all and I am confident that if water can't get in than dirt won't be much of an issue either.The camera makes Quicktime movies. You can dump them into a folder on any computer and watch them frame by frame with Quicktime player. You can also import the fies into iMovie and probably into other Quicktime based editors. You can frame by frame on the camera as well but it takes some practice. There is an HDMI out.Downsides: Limited zoom and it appears to be electronic instead of optical, although I could be mistaken. Zoom is pretty slow.Battery life is not that awesome but I have not been careful about fully charging it. It goes down faster than I anticipated. I don't know enough to truly comment about this.Video quality is pretty compressed looking. Lots of edginess and some blocking. For my purposes it does not matter, but you would not win any director of photography awards. Still photo quality (5 meg) is about what you get out of a good cell phone.The remote that I bought separately is worthless. It sort of works but it is hard to tell what is happening and the buttons are intermittent.Upsides: Turns on to take a video within 3 secondsvery smallno moving partstough60 FPS 720p mode for great sports analysismountable on tripodwaterproofcontrols are simple and well laid outplug into USB to dump video onto you computerQuicktime video format - flexible.HDMI outcheapThis is a great tool but if you are used to a 30x optical zoom with your camcorder this camera is a different device. I would want to have acamcorder with a better zoom/lens and picture quality to take on a scenic vacation or safari, for example.