Will the camera kit allow you to view images from a usb flash drive?

You can use a USB flash drive & the camera connection kit.

Plug the USB flash drive (works the same with an SD card) into your computer & create a new folder titled DCIM. Then put your movie/photo files into the folder. The files must have a filename with exactly 8 characters long (no spaces) plus the file extension (i.e., my-movie.mov; DSCN0164.jpg).

Now plug the flash drive into the iPad using the camera connection kit. Open the Photos app, the movie/photo files should appear & you can import. (You can not export using the camera connection kit.)

Using The iPad Camera Connection Kit

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4101

 Cheers, Tom 😉

I've never tried it, but you can try. The top level folder name must be DCIM with your folders inside.

 Cheers, Tom 😉