FisherPrice KidTough Waterproof Digital Camera Blue

Great… for tiny tots only!
Rating:1 out of 5 stars
Unless you’re buying for a two, three, okay maybe a four-year old, steer clear. While this camera is “functional”, it’s really not usable to take pictures, even for a child. The LCD is useless (grainy, very dark) and the resolution of the photos is not suitable for printing (unless you’re creating stamps). This is really an ‘interactive toy’ for the tiniest of tots, not a camera. Kids are fairly astute nowadays — my 6 year old daughter, having used her Mom’s little Casio point-and-shoot only a few times before, didn’t ‘buy’ into this camera at all (no, she’s not a spoiled brat Rather than wasting [...] on this product, if your child is just a little older, you may consider buying one of the inexpensive point-and-click cameras, along with a [...]Snug-It silicone case (sold here on Amazon).

Will NOT stay on!
Rating:1 out of 5 stars
This is the second Kid-Tough camera we got. The first one would not stay on so FP replaced it, and the new one came yesterday, and we are having the same problem.

It’s a big disappointment because it’s well built, and my 3 year old knows how to use it… but it will not stay on. Even with brand new batteries.

Lousy Pictures
Rating:2 out of 5 stars
I am returning this. My cell phone (which is 3 yrs old) takes better pictures. Between the poor image quality and the really crappy lense, you have to hold still and focus on something with decent lighing. The flash almost always over exposes. Too much for a 3 yr old. The button in the front is also very difficult for him. I know he likes to take pictures and gets the concept, because he’ll do it with my phone. He lost interest in this within 5 minutes. 1.3 Megapixels?? Why?

I do give credit for the durability, and the overall design, but they could have put a better camera in it. The throw aways at CVS are 10 times better in picture quality.

BEWARE of Malware infection!
Rating:1 out of 5 stars
The camera itself is nothing short of awesome for our 3 year old. It takes acceptable pictures for his use, it seems indestructible and he absolutely loves it. The one thing that I just can’t overlook, though, is that ours was infected with Malware (win32.rajump) and it attempted to infect our PC when we connected the USB cable. Win32.rajump is a worm that spreads through removable drives (this camera operates as a removable drive when connected to your PC) and opens a backdoor on your PC. This is totally unacceptable and down-right malicious in my mind. Thank goodness for Norton. I am wondering if this is a problem with the factory sealed models, also? It may just be a result of opting for the ‘Frustration Free Packaging’ option. Since it is taken from the factory packaging prior to shipping to you, there are then opportunities for someone to load malicious software. I just don’t know where it was loaded (factory or after taken from factory packaging), but what I do know is that having a Malware Trojan loaded on this is TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE. The 1 star rating is due to the loaded Malware, not the camera itself (which is 5 star). Everyone that has connected this camera to their PC should perform a thorough scan to check for infection.

Great for kids
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
This camera is great. I bought it for my little nephew. I live in Germany and he is in NC and he wanted to send me pictures. He is 3 years old and this is perfect for him.

Great kid’s Camera
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
This was a gift for our three year old nephew. No sooner than the batteries went in, he went nuts. This camera is easy for him to use, and the software for the computer is very user friendly.

Huge Disappointment
Rating:1 out of 5 stars
We bought this camera for my son last year as he is really taken with photography and wanted to take his own pictures. We have had good luck with Fisher-Price products, so crossed our fingers and hoped it would work.

It doesn’t. It doesn’t to the point and degree that my son is now using my old Canon PowerShot as his camera.

The picture quality is acceptable for a three to five year old photographer, but the camera stopped turning on within six months of use. It only reluctantly gave up the pictures on the SD card. It ate batteries like crazy and simply never lived up to expectations for him or for me.

I was incredibly disappointed with this product and it makes me hesitant to buy ANYTHING Fisher-Price.

Poor Picture Quality, But Durable and Easy
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
I was debating between buying one of these or getting my 3-year-old daughter a similarly priced store-brand digital camera for adults, when my father-in-law got her this Fisher-Price Kid-Tough camera. After seeing the pictures this takes, I KNOW the similarly priced store brand adult camera would take MUCH better pictures. But the real selling point here is that this camera would be difficult to break by accident, and that it’s easier to use and impossible to goof up the settings.

Given that it’s otherwise easier to use, I was frustrated that the shutter button is so small, recessed, and generally hard for a little finger to press. My daughter’s getting better after snapping some shots with it, but I would have expected a big, raised button (maybe even on the back to be pressed by thumb) for taking the shot.

If I had read reviews on-line before opening the package, I might have suggested we take it back for one of the VTech Preschool Learning Kidizoom Plus cameras, as they seem to have more features (maybe even a timestamp in the file metadata?) and generally better reviews. But my daughter loves her camera, and the pictures are good enough that we can see what she was trying to shoot and even print them out for the fridge. It’s worth the price for that.

Pros:

-Virtually unbreakable and waterproof

-Easy for little hands to hold

-No settings for kids to mess up

Cons:

-Terrible pictures

-Dim LCD Screen/Bad low-light pictures

-The shutter button can be hard to press

-No date/time saved to metadata (neither the camera or the computer you transfer pics to have any idea what date/time they were taken).

Note:

My anti-virus software said the SETUP.EXE program that the camera tried to run when we plugged it in was a Trojan horse. I know anti-virus programs throw a lot of false positives, but I didn’t run it just in case.

Battery hog
Rating:1 out of 5 stars
I am amazed that this camera is getting such great reviews. I have never left an on-line review before but feel I have to balance what I’ve read so far. It honestly makes me lose faith in on-line reviews and I will take them with a large grain of salt in the future. There’s no question that this camera is durable, but that’s about where the positives end for me.

The main problem is that the batteries last for about a day. If you buy this camera, buy stock in a battery company the same day. I’m not exaggerating when I say expect about a day out of the batteries. The other problem, as some people have said, is that the picture quality is HORRIBLE. I realize it’s a toy, but come on! With technology these days they could have done much better. They are all very grainy and 9 out of 10 are out of focus.

I think you’d be better off buying a used “real” digital camera or even a cheap new one and let your kids play with that if they’re 4 or 5 or older. When you factor in how much you’ll spend for batteries with this you’ll probably be ahead of the game.

A nice camera you can drop without worry
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
Bought for a girls 7th birthday. This was well received and is being well used.

It’s nice to be able not to worry and not to have to ‘help’her use this the buttons are easy to use..There seem to be two picture quality settings we’re trying the higher resolution now (I thought the first setting was a bit grainy but she was quite happy) It’s a camera for a child to take pictures with by themselves… it’s not a photographers camera for brilliant photo’s

It doesn’t have an sd card slot (or if it does I haven’t found it!)

It downloads easily (the usb access is behind the battery door) a small screwdriver is useful to access batteries or usb port)

I’m not sure of it’s memory size yet but we downloaded after nearly 250 snaps so we could look at them.

She is having a blast and collecting some nice memories all by herself.

durable, easy to use- but one BIG shortcoming
Rating:3 out of 5 stars
A lot of people rave about this toy and how easy it is, but I think there are a few serious drawbacks. One is in fact a safety issue which makes it a pretty big deal.

Pros:

1. I agree with all the five star reviews that praise this camera’s durability. This toy will probably last longer than any other item my son currently plays with. It is built to last.

2. Easy to use- my 3 year old was able to pretty much master the buttons and start taking pictures within 30 minutes. For myself, I opened the box, put in batteries and was ready to go, very intuitive.

3. Very kid friendly and my son loved it and wanted to take pictures of everything right away.

Cons:

1. BIG DRAWBACK AND CONCERN: The flash is extremely bright and powerful. But there is NO way to turn off the flash function. There were a few times while my son was getting familiar with the camera’s use (not really ever having used one before except mine with my help) when he turned the camera around and accidentally hit the shutter button and had this extremely bright flash go off right in front of his eyes. He complained of having trouble seeing for a few HOURS after this and that his eyes hurt. Even after I covered the flash with tape and construction paper it still gives off a bright flash. We also have a young baby at home and a few times, innocently he wanted close up pictures of his baby brother. So now we’ve basically limited him to using it only in bright daylight and if his baby brother isn’t around. The camera’s shutter speed and aperture are set so that you pretty much need the flash except in outdoor sunlight conditions, anything else without the flash is dark and almost unrecognizable. So when we were finally able to completely block out the flash for safety reasons the camera became unusable. I think this is a really big design flaw, at the very least give the parents an OPTION to turn off the flash or make the flash not as bright. Of course if your child is old enough to be careful and responsible enough not to point it at a baby or himself/herself then it’s fine- but by that point they probably could be using a real camera. I don’t think it’s a lot to ask to simply have an ‘off’ switch for the camera flash given that repeated exposure to that magnitude of flash certainly has potential to cause eye damage.

2. Big battery drain, have to replace batteries almost weekly. The cost of 4 AAA batteries each week adds up.

3. I found that, at least for my son (3 years old) the pictures display too briefly after the shutter button is clicked, this is also not adjustable (yes I know this is a kid’s camera), but I think the lag time should be a little longer. Most of the time, by the time my son hit the button and looked down, the picture was gone- which takes a lot out of fun out of the camera for the kids to see the picture they just took.

In conclusion, I think for a child 4-5 years old this is a great, durable, simple camera. But you really must have a child that can use the camera with some responsibility and care, certainly NOT for 3 year olds (as the packaging suggests). The intense and powerful flash that cannot be turned off, I believe is a hazard not just to a young child using it but even an older child who may take picture of young children/babies and doesn’t understand that the flash may hurt their eyes.

Why did they Put the Delete Button Where Kid’s Can Get It???
Rating:2 out of 5 stars
We bought one of these cameras for our son’s second birthday, and it worked for three days before breaking — and not from a drop or anything, it just stopped taking pictures. Fisher-Price replaced it (thank you), but now that it works consistently, we’ve discovered another problem — the delete button is as big as, as accessible as, and looks just like the navigation buttons.

We just had a twenty-minute crying fit that ended with us having to take the camera away and hide it because he accidentially deleted a picture he took last night and I didn’t have time to back up to a computer.

Why would they design it like this? I wish I could recommend this camera more highly because on the whole our son really likes it, but between the first one breaking and trying to explain that to him, and now the drama with deleting pictures…I sort of wish we hadn’t bought it.