Choosing a Tripod: The Real DealJul 09 '00 Write an essay on this topic.Only one of the opinions in the photo section here has related to the selection of tripods. Since Epinions does not provide a placeholder for reviews of tripods and heads, I'll add it here. A Tripod is Your Best Friend My general rule about using a tripod is this: if I am putting my time into careful composition, exposure calculation, selecting the depth of field to be used, filtration and all the other aspects which go into making a good image, using a tripod is a must. Why do I say this? It is because using a tripod ensures an exposure which is maximally sharp. (Of course this advice goes out the door if what you want is expressive use of camera movement...) If what you want are professional quality images you'll use a tripod (or some other form of camera support) for virtually every shot. A Tripod is Your Worst Enemy A tripod is heavy to carry. The most commonly recommended legset, the Bogen/Manfrotto 3021 (USA number!) weighs almost 6 pounds w/o a head. Add a decent head and the tripod will weigh 8 pounds or more! You'll learn to hate carrying the weight of a tripod with you pretty quickly. A tripod takes time to set up. There are two principal brands of legsets used by serious photographers: Bogen and Gitzo. Bogen tripods use either a flip lock lever or a thumb screw to allow the legs to extend (some models are fancier and have an "automatic" mechanisim, but in general they are too large and heavy for 35mm photography). These are the tripods which are fast to set up. Figure on a minute or so to get the legs extended. Gitzo tripods have a fussy twist collar which allows the legs to extend. You have to be careful to do these in the correct order or it will take several, perhaps frustrating, minutes to set the tripod up. Once you've learned the Gitzo trick, they set up about as quickly as the Bogen tripods. Other brands, such as Slik or Velbon have variants on the Bogen lever or Gitzo collar system. All of them take longer to set up than you might want. It takes time to attach your camera. Most tripods purchased by consumers require that a screw on the tripod head be screwed into a hole in the bottom plate of the camera. This is a slow and frustrating process. Better tripod heads will use a "quick release" system which allows the camera to be attached to the tripod in a second or two. Tripods limit your camera placement options. Lower priced tripods typically have a central leg brace which prevents you from using the tripod on uneven ground. It also prevents you from using your tripod to get low angle shots. Better tripods do not have a central leg brace and do have adjustable leg angles. The best of these allow you to get your camera right down to ground level if you so desire. So What Tripod Should I Choose? First, you have to realize that the 24.95 Velbon in the camera store is not really going to do the job. It will have a central leg brace and a clumsy head. The head may have a quick release mechanism, but it will be made out of plastic and be unable to really attach a camera to the head in a secure manner. So get ready for a shock, you are going to spend around $100 for a decent entry level tripod. Previously in this article, I have mentioned two brands of tripod: Bogen and Gitzo. These are the most popular brands of tripod legs among serious photographers. Both brands are sturdy. In general, Gitzo tripods are a bit lighter for equivalent load capacity than Bogen tripods. In all cases Bogen tripods represent excellent value for the money. Gitzo offers a few legsets which have no equivalent in the Bogen lineup, although the converse is not true. For most people, I will recommend the purchase of either the Bogen 3001 or the Bogen 3021 legset. Both of these are durable legsets. If you have a typical 35mm setup and are 5'8" or less the 3001 legset is very good. If you are taller, or if you have a heavier 35mm setup (an EOS 3 and some pro level lenses) the 3021 is a better choice. The 3001 legset goes for about $65 and the 3021 legset goes for about $100. Both of these tripods lack the central leg brace common on cheaper tripods and both have legs with adjustable angles which allow you to get close to the ground. The 3021 has a two piece center post which allows you to get the camera closer to the ground still. The drawback to both of the tripods is weight -- around 3.5 pounds for the 3001 and around 6 pounds for the 3021. Both of these tripods are also bulky. If you need a tripod for travelling, Gitzo makes a legset called the 026 "Weekender" (about $200). This tripod is quite compact (18" folded) and weighs about 2 pounds. In my experience it will support a light 35mm outfit. It is an excellent travel tripod and is my mainstay tripod for backpacking. Note that none of these tripods include a tripod head, that is a piece which has to be purchased separately. Choosing a Head. There are three principal types of tripod heads. These are: the pan/tilt head, the ballhead and finally the video head. You want to steer clear of video heads for use with still cameras. The reason for this is that it is extremely difficult to take vertical format shots with a video head. That leaves the pan/tilt head and the ballhead. I'll discuss the pan/tilt head first. PAN/TILT HEADS A pan/tilt head is the classic tripod head most people are familiar with. It has three knobs which allow the angle of the camera to be adjusted in all three dimensions, although each dimension needs to be adjusted separately. This makes pan/tilt heads somewhat slow to use, although they are excellent for landscape shots which include a horizon line and for architectural photography. A chief advantage of pan/tilt heads is their reasonable cost. Bogen makes two excellent pan/tilt heads. The 3029 (3030 w/quick release) is a basic model and costs about $45. It is a quality unit with smooth motions and very positive locking in all three axis. The 3030 costs a few dollars more and includes a quick release system based on the Bogen rectangular plate system. Both this and the venerable Bogen hex plate system are good quick releases, although they will only work with Bogen heads. The other Bogen pan/tilt head I would recommend is the 3047. This is the big brother to the 3030 and uses the Bogen hex plate quick release system. The principal advantage of this head over the 3029/3030 is that it includes two bubble levels which make it easier to use for architecture and landscape photography. This head typically goes for about $65. BALLHEADS. A ballhead is a different solution to supporting a still camera. Ballheads consist of a platform which is mounted on a large (usually) metal ball which fits into the base of the head. Together these form a ball and socket joint which allows a camera to be aimed quickly. A single twist of the locking knob snugs everything up and you are ready to take a picture. I am mostly a landscape photographer, and of the two types of head, I vastly prefer using a ballhead. The chief problem with ballheads is that they are expensive. While a very good panhead can be had for less than $50, a $50 ballhead is likely to be, well, junk. I've owned a couple of low end Bogen ballheads and was way less than happy with them. However, for those of you who aren't afraid to waste money, the Bogen 3413QR looks promising for a sub-$50 ballhead. To really get a good ballhead, you are going to spend in the neighborhood of $300. The (somewhat) undisputed king of ballheads is the Arca-Swiss B1. Cost: $400. I currently use a medium Kaiser Pro Ballhead which has been modified by Kirk Enterprises to accept the Arca-Swiss style QR plates. (more about this in the next section) The non-QR version of this head is currently $200. I've used this head for about 6 years with a relatively light SLR outfit (Elan II w/o any heavy lenses) and the results have been generally very good. I have also used this head with a Pentax 67 MF outfit and I was not as happy with the results. Note that the Pentax is a big heavy honker with viscious mirror slap. Even when MLU is used the shutter sends a shudder through the whole setup. The Kaiser wasn't up to this. Recently I purchased an EOS 3 and spent big bucks on much heavier lenses. Especially when used with a 400mm lens my formerly trusty Kaiser does not hold up. Because of this I recently ordered a Kirk Enterprises BH-1 ballhead ($360). I have also used a small Kaiser ballhead on my Gitzo 026. This is a nice little head for my backpacking tripod. The non-QR version is $69. I paid $115 for the Kirk modified version which accepts the Arca-Swiss QR plates. I don't expect this head to hold big loads, but it works well for a light camera/lens combination (mostly an Elan II w/20-35 lens). There are other brands of ballheads you will run into. One of the brands which seems to be replacing Kaiser here in the US is Giotto. I have a small Giotto head for use with my point and shoot on the Gitzo 026. It isn't bad, but the machining of the head is somewhat rough, which leads to less than pleasant operational characteristics. This would be a real pain with a larger and heavier camera (the Giotto is about the same size as the small Kaiser I own). I am somewhat reserved about recommending the Giotto heads. They are reasonably inexpensive, and Kirk Enterprises will modify them to accept the Arca-Swiss QR plates. However I find the operation of the small Giotto head (model 1003) which I own to be somewhat rough. It improves if some grease is applied to the ball and then cleaned up with a paper towel, but the action is still not as nice as my Kaiser heads. However, they are quite serviceable and even the large pro level head is only $110. These do represent a reasonable alternative to the cheap Bogen ball heads. Bogen also has a couple of more expensive ballheads in the $200 range. These look promising although I have no personal experience with them. So, what do I recommend in a ballhead. Hold onto your wallet, because the Kirk BH-1 and the Arca-Swiss B1 are what I would recommend. Both of these heads are brutally expensive. To a lesser extent I will recommend the Kaiser heads, but not the quick release versions. Getting these modified by Kirk to accept the Arca-Swiss QR system will probably cost about $75 to $100. At this price point you should strongly consider Kirk's own head. Finally, Linhof makes a couple of nice heads, the Profi II and the Profi III. A company called Really Right Stuff will modify these to accept the Arca-Swiss style quick release plates. By the time this surgery has been done they will cost as much as the Kirk or Arca-Swiss heads... Quick Releases Every decent tripod needs a quick release system. In the proceeding section, you might have picked up on a theme: Arca-Swiss style QR plates. For me, the Arca-Swiss QR system is the best there is. The Arca-Swiss system involves small plates which attach to your camera body (or lens tripod collar) and which are clamped in via a clamp which rests atop the tripod head. It takes a second or two to attach a camera to the tripod and the attachment is *solid*. The plates which are used are very low profile and are machined to match the size and contours of the piece of equipment they are attached to. Since they are so compact and clean, a photographer typically purchases a plate for each piece of equipment which needs one and leaves it attached at all times. This contrasts mightily with the Bogen hex plate system. Bogen hex plates come in one size, and that size is typically clumsy for the piece of equipment you are attaching it to (unless that piece of equipment is an MF or LF body). The principal advantage of the Bogen QR system is that it is very quick to use: you just snap the camera into the spring loaded mount and everything is done. Bogen also makes a similar QR system which uses rectangular plates. This sytem can be found on the 3030 head and on some of the newer, inexpensive Bogen ballheads. If you have a small system which only requires body plates for a 35mm body, heads which use the Bogen rectangular plate QR system are quite nice. The big gotcha here is that there are two companies, Kirk Enterprises and Really Right Stuff, which make a vast array of accessories which fit the Arca-Swiss quick release system. Things like macro focusing rails, flash brackets, auxillary supports, etc. etc. are designed by these companies to fit the Arca-Swiss QR system. If you think you might get into things like macro photography, or if you might want to set up a studio, the range of accessories which fit the Arca-Swiss system make it the QR system of choice. Down to Brass Tacks If you don't want to spend a ton of money and want a good tripod, the Bogen 3001 legset and the 3029 or 3030 head is a good choice. The legset is very sturdy, but it is better suited to short people. For people over about 5'6" I would recommend the Bogen 3021 legset with the same head. If you want a whizzier head, get the 3047. In fact, the general recommendation on the legset is the Bogen 3001 for short people and the 3021 for normal to tall people. If you don't mind spending horrendous amounts of money, Gitzo makes some very nice carbon fibre legsets which go in the $500 and up range. Bogen has recently introduced CF legsets of their own which go for around $350. I would expect these legsets to be of the highest quality, consistent with other legsets from Bogen. If you don't mind spending a ton of money on a head, I would recommend either the Kirk BH-1 or the Arca-Swiss B1 (this head currently -- 7/00 -- seems to be on perpetual backorder at the factory). If you want to save $120 on the head, the Kirk modified Giotto heads might be good. Check out www.kirkphoto.com for more details. As far as Bogen ballheads are concerned, 3435QR and the 3436QR seem to have promise. I have no experiences with these heads, but Bogen does seem to have changed their philosophy on ballhead design since I last played with their products. These are certainly worth checking out. There are many other brands of tripods available, the most common brands being Slik and Velbon. My experiences with both of these brands has been less than satisfactory. Slik does have a high quality line of tripods which some people seem to like. Velbon makes a CF legset which appears pretty good when you scope it out in a store. There are weird tripods like the Benbo which work great for macro shots, but are more or less useless for anything else (too hard to set up). There are many more specialized support solutions which work well in specific situations but which aren't all that flexible. However, when you need 'em, you need 'em. For someone buying their first camera support I would recommend sticking with a traditional tripod. Buy the more specialized supports as need dictates. It is inevitable that you will end up with a closet full of camera supports. Finally, remember that a tripod is, in my opinion, the most important camera accessory. In the immortal words of Phillip Greenspun (see www.photo.net/photo): "bad photographers debate the merits of the F4 vs. the EOS 1. Somewhat better photographers debate the merits of the Yashica T4 and the Contax T2. The best photographers though talk tripods, tripod heads and quick releases."  |
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