Tripod recommendations?

[6x6TLL]

Thanks Neil,

I've never heard of Feisol. Where are they based? Is it all made in China (like Benbo), or somwhere else? All the ones you linked are 2kg or more, which is about what my existing Gitzo weighs. I was hoping to come down to around 1.5kg if possible, plus ball head (which will have to be another post).

It's always a trade-off between stability (bigger, heavier) and portability (smaller, lighter). If it's too big or heavy, it will end up being left at home, wasted money. If it's too light or flimsy, it won't really help provide a stable platform from which to take pictures.

I'd also like to know if CF tripods do well in water. Seawater especially. I expect the edges are sealed so the fiber doesn't soak up moisture, right?

[jose angel]

I have a CF that is sealed on the bottom leg (it has a glued "spike"), so it can manage salted water or whatever up to the length of this tube. The CF material is built with polyester resin or so. Just rinse it and that's all.
But if the water comes inside the tubes, that's another topic. Enclosed salted water isn't good inside almost everything, I guess. Think that the threads inside are quite soft aluminum, and screws are steel. If so, you'd need to rinse the whole tripod; just take all pieces apart, rinse them and let them dry before mounting. Only you know if the pic is worth the pain...
IMHO, a CF Gitzo series 2 do the task as an all round lightweight tripod for 6x6 and press/field 4x5 cameras. A series 3 is definitely the right one, but not as lightweight as the 2 (excuse me, I'm not used to the current Gitzo nomenclature). You have to know how much "lightweight" you want.
BTW, 10kg is a lot of weight. You don't need a tripod that handle a "minimum" of 10kg. If so, you should use the heaviest Gitzos (aluminum series 5 or so). I find quite difficult to know the real weight rating of tripods; it seem to me that manufacturer`s charts are more based in marketing than in reality. Think that usually, the heavier the better tripod.
And, I`d get the right height. Measure your eye position, and look for a tripod+head+camera that reach that eye position. A taller one is wasted height, a smaller one a pain to use.

[andrewch59]

I was recently in much the same predicament, I have a very heavy, sturdy manfrotto, but needed something lighter for backpacking and easy to load on my bike. After much searching I settled on the sirui w-2204 with k-30x ballhead, great setup for my 4x5 shen hao.
Its light, carbon fibre and the bottom sections are waterproof. At 6'6" I am tall but the sirui is tall enough for me, and the ball head folds up with the tripod into a supplied shoulder bag

[Len Middleton]

What's a "Green Monster"?


Where do I find a wife to help carry...?

:-p

Green Monster (in our context) => Calumet C1 8x10 camera was built in two versions, the later black cast aluminium, and the earlier and lighter (but not lightweight) green cast magnesium version aka "Green Monster"

Solid relatively low cost well built 8x10 cameras.

I had one for a while.

I will let someone else help you with your second question...

[Bernice Loui]

Still of the opinion and experience that wood remains one of the very best materials for a outdoor tripod. Second is fiberglass (which is a composite plastic similar in many ways to "Carbon Fiber" which is perceived to be superior to all, but not.).

Wood is light weight for it's strength and what should be seriously consider is the elasticity and dampening abilities of wood. This is one of the reasons why Surveyor's tripods are made of wood-special fiber glass with aluminum being the least prefer choice. Taking any tripod outdoors means it will get wet, dropped, bashed in various ways, dropped, bent, used as a walking-hiking aid and a lot more. If one considers the forces and stress placed on trees outdoors, it is really not that different than the life of an outdoor tripod.

Having been a Gitzo and numerous other metal tripod user for decades, these days mostly given up on them as one dent on the leg or similar moving part can severely affect it's operation.

As for weight, more weight properly placed equals more stability. This is not about weight supporting capacity, good tripods are much about stability and ability to damp unwanted vibrations that can-will affect image quality.


Bernice

[6x6TLL]

Thanks Jose,

yes 10kg is a lot, but seeing how there doesn't seem to be a standard, it seems like a decent ball-parkish figure to use. It sounds like a series 2 or 3 would be ok for my use. I'm still very impressed with the idea of the Novoflex, and it doesn't seem any more pricey than a similar tripod from RRS or GItzo, yet would allow me to swap out legs and have different sets for different uses (e.g. light for travel/carrying, heavier for when I can drive or need a lot of support).

Does anyone here actually use Novoflex, or seen one in use?

Bernice, wood is lovely, it's just too heavy! If I were driving to the location or had a Sherpa with me, I'd definitely consider it. (Maybe that's what Joe was referring to with the "wife" he spoke of? :-p). But wandering around the mountains on my own, or even spending 4-5 hours walking around downtown at night, it has to be something reasonably light and compact enough to carry for extended periods of time.

Andrew, I've seen the Siruis and they look good, until I learned that they are actually cheap Chinese knock-offs. I'd rather support the locals, be it German, American, French/Italian, or Japanese. Yes, they cost more, but I'm paying for original know-how and engineering, rather than someone's lax relationship with IP.

I'm wondering if a ball head is really necessary. Leg adjustments for rough settings, movements for fine tuning? Maybe a simple leveling head with 10-15 degrees of play would be enough? It would be a whole lot lighter...!

I also found this site recently, which does scientific comparisons of a range of tripod's stability and damping: https://thecentercolumn.com/

[Bob Salomon]

Thanks Jose,

yes 10kg is a lot, but seeing how there doesn't seem to be a standard, it seems like a decent ball-parkish figure to use. It sounds like a series 2 or 3 would be ok for my use. I'm still very impressed with the idea of the Novoflex, and it doesn't seem any more pricey than a similar tripod from RRS or GItzo, yet would allow me to swap out legs and have different sets for different uses (e.g. light for travel/carrying, heavier for when I can drive or need a lot of support).

Does anyone here actually use Novoflex, or seen one in use?

Bernice, wood is lovely, it's just too heavy! If I were driving to the location or had a Sherpa with me, I'd definitely consider it. (Maybe that's what Joe was referring to with the "wife" he spoke of? :-p). But wandering around the mountains on my own, or even spending 4-5 hours walking around downtown at night, it has to be something reasonably light and compact enough to carry for extended periods of time.

Andrew, I've seen the Siruis and they look good, until I learned that they are actually cheap Chinese knock-offs. I'd rather support the locals, be it German, American, French/Italian, or Japanese. Yes, they cost more, but I'm paying for original know-how and engineering, rather than someone's lax relationship with IP.

I'm wondering if a ball head is really necessary. Leg adjustments for rough settings, movements for fine tuning? Maybe a simple leveling head with 10-15 degrees of play would be enough? It would be a whole lot lighter...!

I also found this site recently, which does scientific comparisons of a range of tripod's stability and damping: https://thecentercolumn.com/

Yes, I have used both the 3 and 4 leg Novoflex Triopods and Quadropods. They are very strong, carry lots of weight, are exceptionally versatile and damper vibration very quickly in either CF or aluminum.

BTW, probably the best test on tripods was done 4 or 5 years ago in Leica Foto magazine.
They put graph paper on a wall, taped a laser pointer to the tripod legs, tied a weight to a string that was also attached to the leg.
Then let the weight strike the leg and photographed the movement of the projected laser beam onto the graph paper. And timed how long for the beam to stop moving. They published the actual test pictures.

I seriously doubt that an individual like the one that you linked to could convince all of the tripod companies that he tested to send him tripods to test and I doubt that he would buy them all.
Also, he doesn’t seem to include who he is, what his expertise is or his background and how he does these measurements.

There is also an interesting test report on the back page of the Berelbach brochure from a German testing institute with test results on tripods.

I used to have my own test procedure that I did in camera stores. I brought a shot glass with me that I would fill half way with water. I would put this on the top plate of various tripods I was interested in and would lightly tap a leg and see how long it took the water to stop moving.

I also sold tripods to Questar Corp. for their telescopes. These were rather high end scopes.
They had a large concrete pad outside their back door. They also had a very large employee who had to weigh 350 pounds. Their test was to set up tripods with their scopes on them, look through the eyepiece and have the big guy jump up and down while an engineer looked through the scope. The winning tripods that they bought for resale were the ones that had the least vibration and settled the quickest. Linhof won that order.

I have also sold Berelbach tripods to TeleVue for their telescopes, but you didn’t want wooden ones.

[jose angel]

Personally (I know it must be matter of taste), a ball head is not necessary.... but a head really does. Small adjustments without a head are difficult, clumsy and slow at best. I usually need to make small adjustments.
Ball heads are light and capable, although sometimes not the best for fine adjustments. I find panning ability really useful. Three way heads are nice, but usually... unappealing?. To me, the best head for almost everything are the geared ones, most times really worth the weight. But I know lightweight needs put them aside.
At the end I use low height, big diameter ball heads, and also geared ones, depending on the task. Some ball heads are really good, and not so expensive.
BTW, I find somewhat hard to believe all that scientific explanations about dampening and so. I belong to the stone age, so to me the best tripod is a great piece of concrete or granite. For sure I'm an ape.
Cameras, mirrors and all this are not always the same, and I have never seen tests based on real image differences. I know material A is better than B, both have different stiffness, dampening properties etc. but I wonder if it really applies to the real life of a given tripod under a given camera. Weight really does.

[6x6TLL]

Thanks Bob!

Coming from you with your background and experience, it means a lot. Would you buy one today? (feel free to PM me if you don't want to make a public statement)

I'll keep my eyes peeled for any special offers on Gitzo or RRS, but if I have to pay full retail, Novoflex sounds like a really attractive option.

[neil poulsen]

Thanks Neil,

I've never heard of Feisol. Where are they based? Is it all made in China (like Benbo), or somwhere else? All the ones you linked are 2kg or more, which is about what my existing Gitzo weighs. I was hoping to come down to around 1.5kg if possible, plus ball head (which will have to be another post) . . .

Oops! Wrong links, which have been corrected in my post. I have the 3372, which is terrific. Weight is 1.75kg.

Among the things I like about this tripod . . .

o Weight, which is just under 4 lbs. My legs weigh less than my tripod head, which is a 3039 Manfrotto.

o Very beefy legs. The upper section has a 38mm diameter.

o Feisol calls the three linked tripods (and a couple of others) their "Elite" tripods. Versus cast metal, their crowns are machined metal. As a result, they're stronger AND lighter.

o Very quick and easy to remove the plate on the crown. I purchased a couple of extra plates, which makes exchanging heads quick and easy.

o I also have a center-post, which was quite reasonably priced. I use the center-post for digital, 6x9's, and my light-weight 4x5. I use a plate (no center-post) for my 8x10, which weighs a little less than a Deardorff. (I could use a Deardorff 8x10 on this tripod; but, I wouldn't go much heavier. For example, I wouldn't use the heavier, black Calumet 8x10 on this tripod.)

It's also possible to get a leveling attachment for the 3374, which is available on the four section version of my tripod. I've had an opportunity to try out a leveler, and I think it's more fuss than it's worth. But if you need a leveler, one would want the 3472. One would also want an attachment for the crown that includes a bubble level.

The "rapid" to which the Feisol site refers is is an embellishment that I don't have. With twist type type tripods like the (older) Feisol's and Gitzo's (etc.), one needs to make sure that an upper leg section is at least as tight as the one beneath. Otherwise, tightening the leg section beneath can loosen the one above. The "rapid" feature resolves this issue. But if you buy older used, don't worry about not having this feature. I almost prefer the older version, because it's a simpler design. It's second nature to properly tighten each leg. Again, the legs are beefy, so they don't need a lot of tightening.

I've sort of assumed that these tripods are Asian, but I'm not sure. You can purchase directly from Feisol (website), or they stock some of the Feisols at B&H. I bought mine from Kerry Thallman, who sold them at one point. (No longer.)

Gitzo's have their place. I have a Giant Studex 5, when I need a lot of elevation. But for everything else, my Feisol is a first rate tripod.