iPhone 4’s Video Competition

720p recording with ‘tap to focus’ and a cheap app for editing packagesAt HD User Magazine we have reviewed the following ‘personal camcorders’

FlipHD

“You’ll need plenty of light and a steady hand to get anything usable” 

Kodak i8 –

“I don’t want you thinking the video is anything you can use, unless you work on a very obscure digital channel! The smearing is awful and ‘jello-cam’ effect is truly wobbly especially at 1080p.”

and the new Sony Ericsson Vivaz.

“The low light video ability is so bad that Sony have included a video light that covers a few inches in front and isn’t useful for anything but close ups.”

All 720p enabled camcorder, the Vivaz adding a phone to its features. We didn’t think much of the performance of these video cameras mainly because of the bad low light performance, the difficulty of getting anything useful without support and bad performance generally.

The new iPhone 4 promises 720p performance like the others and neat tricks like ‘tap to focus’, something Sony have in their more expensive camcorders. But maybe the winning feature isn’t the sensor but is the $4.99 iMovie app which will allow you to package your edit in an iMovie theme and send it straight from the phone. You can add stills and music and by doing so gloss over any bad video exposure.

Promising in theory but lets just wait until we wear our thumbs out doing transitions on the way back from our holidays.