Tripod advice?

[kye]

I occasionally use a tripod at home and have gotten fed up with the $100 ball-head Manfrotto I bought some years ago and am now pondering getting a better one.

I typically use it for:

• Getting stable shots on very long lenses - for example with GH5 + 400mm + 2x digital zoom (1600mm equivalent)
• Getting shots of the moon/sun during eclipses or super-moons etc
• Getting more run-of-the-mill shots (which it works ok for now)

The issues I have with the current tripod are:

• it doesn't pan or tilt smoothly, so when you push it just flexes and rebounds to the same position but if you push a bit harder it 'jumps' to a new position (it's probably plastic on plastic).  I don't pan or tilt while recording, I just want to be able to aim it properly.
• it sags, so you unlock the head, frame the shot, lock the head, and it sags down because the lens is sticking out a long way, thus making you resort to the above.

Obviously a $5000 tripod would be great, but I don't use it frequently enough to justify spending a serious amount of money on a high-quality one.  I don't really care what it weighs as I don't take it anywhere.

What is the minimum I'd have to spend to get something that would actually be functional to use at 800mm+ focal lengths?

[Snowfun]

I use a Kessler K-pod with Hercules head for Astrophotography. It stays where you put it. Not “budget” but certainly a lot cheaper than a quality cine tripod. I hate carrying it because it tries to snap my arms but once it’s in position it’s superb. One alternative might be to go for a telescope tripod - these are solid and not needing fluid heads are cheap(er). A Celestron Advanced VX Mount for example will come with a study set of legs and you could easily amend the mount.

[Snowfun]

Kessler K pod plus head approx £1200 

Payload approx 70 kg.

The Celestron telescope mount is approx £900.

[BTM_Pix]

4 hours ago, kye said:

 I don't pan or tilt while recording, I just want to be able to aim it properly.

If you absolutely promise that you won’t want to pan/tilt while recording then a geared head might well be the solution for you.

The venerable Manfrotto 410 will support up to around 5kg and won’t break the bank.

[Tim Sewell]

For the money, this (and the many other versions available under different brand names) can definitely do a reasonable job:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00139W0XM/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

[PPNS]

get a second hand sachtler ace or libec something. don't get some bottom of the barrel shit that's barely better than whatever you have right now. even if you're not planning on panning/tilting while recording, it can actually be useful at some point in the future. 

[Benjamin Hilton]

Honestly something like this would probably do you fine:
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/842086-REG/Magnus_VT_4000_VT_4000_Tripod_System.html

 

[Jay60p]

Yes, I would go with a fluid head.

If, like me, you are using it at home and not professionally, you don’t need to spend
Thousands for the ultra heavy duty sachtlers etc

Today I would consider something like this:

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1220489-REG/e_image_eg05a2_two_stage_aluminum_tripod_with.html/reviews

Or a head like this

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1676168-REG/magnus_fbvh_500_video_head_with.html/reviews

Or a Manfrotto rated for the weight of your camera.

I’ve used a Manfrotto 3063 mini fluid head for 20+? Years.
It is still as smooth as new. It does smooth pans with a 500mm & X2 telephoto and an X-T3.
I shot the live motion of the moon with it, still locks solid.

You would want a tripod with a bowl base for leveling, otherwise you’ll have to adjust the leg lengths.

I’d never go back to a pan/tilt head.

[TomTheDP]

I prefer going with older used pro equipment over cheap prosumer Chinese stuff. Miller fluid heads often come up for good deals.

[hyalinejim]

On 6/6/2023 at 6:27 AM, BTM_Pix said:

Manfrotto 410

+1 for this. I've had one for 15 years and it's easier to make precise, fine adjustments than with a fluid head. But it's slower when making larger adjustments, particularly with a heavy lens, unless it's mounted at the fulcrum. As a tool for creating static compositions it's excellent. 

For panning I have a Sachtler Ace, which is very good.

[PPNS]

i would also advise everyone to avoid manfrotto at all costs

[kye]

Thanks all for your insights and links - lots of good info and much food for thought.

On 6/6/2023 at 1:27 PM, BTM_Pix said:

If you absolutely promise that you won’t want to pan/tilt while recording then a geared head might well be the solution for you.

The venerable Manfrotto 410 will support up to around 5kg and won’t break the bank.

18 hours ago, hyalinejim said:

+1 for this. I've had one for 15 years and it's easier to make precise, fine adjustments than with a fluid head. But it's slower when making larger adjustments, particularly with a heavy lens, unless it's mounted at the fulcrum. As a tool for creating static compositions it's excellent. 

For panning I have a Sachtler Ace, which is very good.

I never thought about a geared head and the idea that I can put the camera on it and then adjust it while not touching the camera (and interfering with whatever sag there is) seems enticing.  The reviews I read on the 410 were promising although the complaints were that it's stiff and that you need to convert it to Arca Swiss (which I have already standardised on) but these don't seem deal-breakers.

I do wonder how slow it is to use though.  If I see something happening and want to frame it up - how long do you think it would take to adjust?  I know that's a how-long-is-a-piece-of-string style question, but I just don't want the thing I want to look at to have disappeared while I'm twirling knobs as fast as I can.  

Would you pair it with a bowl base to allow a degree of freedom prior to having to adjust with the gears?

Also, considering how much these things all seem to cost I'm pondering more "creative" solutions, like making an extender that will allow me to balance the setup better so they're not front-heavy.  The GH5 400mm combo is not very balanced, and the BMMCC setup isn't that much better....

 

[hyalinejim]

10 minutes ago, kye said:

how long do you think it would take to adjust?

There are two ways of adjusting it. You turn the knob to make fine adjustments. It's stiff, but that's good because it helps you to be precise.

If you need to turn it more than let's say 5 or 10 degrees, though, you would use the other way which involves turning the wavy looking ring thing (which is also quite stiff to turn, so slightly tricky). Then the head will move freely in that axis with no resistance. That's when you'd run into problems with a very heavy setup that isn't balanced - if you wanted to tilt with a front heavy setup then the whole thing will fall forward when you release the wavy thing.

Now, you can avoid all this by only using the fine adjustment but that takes a while. I just tested it there and it's 10 to 12 wrist rotations to turn 45 degrees.

If you were going to get this head then it would be worth figuring out a way to get the rig balanced on it.

[kye]

2 hours ago, hyalinejim said:

There are two ways of adjusting it. You turn the knob to make fine adjustments. It's stiff, but that's good because it helps you to be precise.

If you need to turn it more than let's say 5 or 10 degrees, though, you would use the other way which involves turning the wavy looking ring thing (which is also quite stiff to turn, so slightly tricky). Then the head will move freely in that axis with no resistance. That's when you'd run into problems with a very heavy setup that isn't balanced - if you wanted to tilt with a front heavy setup then the whole thing will fall forward when you release the wavy thing.

Now, you can avoid all this by only using the fine adjustment but that takes a while. I just tested it there and it's 10 to 12 wrist rotations to turn 45 degrees.

If you were going to get this head then it would be worth figuring out a way to get the rig balanced on it.

Thanks, and actually, that doesn't sound too slow at all.  When I've got a long tele setup on the camera then I'm not looking up or down that much normally, and if I needed to quickly rotate it a lot then I could just rotate the tripod legs as I'm mostly shooting on flat surfaces.  I understand about having a balanced rig and that's probably something I should look at regardless, although I don't have any trouble getting my current setup to roughly the right direction, it's just the fine-tuning that is where I have difficulty because it sticks and then gives suddenly and makes adjustments that are too large.  Obviously with the geared head this issue would be completely rectified.

I'm assuming that one of those controls is the one that will enable you to level the horizon?  It seems so, but the description only says that it can go "90° sideways for portrait orientation" but I'm not sure if it would go any amount the other way (ie, the opposite direction to turning the camera to portrait mode) if that's what was required to level the horizon?

[hyalinejim]

2 hours ago, kye said:

90° sideways for portrait orientation

Yes, 90 in one direction and 30 in the other, so even if the legs are on very uneven ground you can still level the horizon.