Ball or Pan-tilt head for 8x10?

[Alan Klein]

I actually prefer video tripod heads even for photography. I can't stand ball-heads, because every time you want to recompose you have to make sure it's level again.

With a video head, it might be a bit more work to get it initially level because you're doing it with the legs (though some tripod legs have a bowl system too). But once it's level, you can move around the video head however you want, and you can be sure the image will stay level with the horizon line even if you recompose by turning or tilting the head.

The only issue is they can sometimes be heavier and bulkier.

I found this video a while ago which pretty much sums up my feelings about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epPSQaYnU8M

I use a 3-way pan-tilt head. Unless the tripod is exactly leveled, I have to readjust anyway once I pan. I can never get the tripod exactly level. Those bulls-eye levels are never exact and it's too much trouble to try to get them level. How do those levelers that attach to the tripod work? Instead of adjusting the legs, you just adjust the leveler attached between the tripod and head.

[Tin Can]

Here is my current solution

Biggest FLM tripod with FLM 1/2 ball 100mm which levels or not, the top plate, then a Sinar head which gives base rotation and tilt

All topped with easy to use Horseman QR

IMG_0109(Edited) by TIN CAN COLLEGE, on Flickr

[Drew Wiley]

The bullseye levels I see on camera store and studio shop leveling devices are a joke. Do y'all know how expensive a true machinist grade one is, or how difficult it is to attach truly flat unless both surfaces have been precision ground to match? Take a look at the leveling base to any serious old survey transit. These are likely to have three equidistant very finicky vial levels.

Now I know someone is going to argue with this and tell me that modern auto-levels and some theodolites come with a basic bullseye level. Yes, but that's because most of them need to be only approximately leveled manually, to within plus or minus eight degrees; and after that, inside those general parameters, the modern auto-leveling mechanisms take over and do the job much more precisely. That kind of technology could easily be built into camera supports too; but nobody would pay the extra eight or ten thousand dollars for something rugged enough to work with 8x10 camera weight (plus it own weight!). And with sheet film work, the film seemingly never sits in the holder dead parallel anyway, so we correct for that when printing.

[Two23]

The bullseye levels I see on camera store and studio shop leveling devices are a joke. Do y'all know how expensive a true machinist grade one is, or how difficult it is to attach truly flat unless both surfaces have been precision ground to match? Take a look at the leveling base to any serious old survey transit. These are likely to have three equidistant very finicky vial levels.

I use a torpedo level in two axis for large format.


Kent in SD

[Drew Wiley]

Find me a torpedo level that is actually level. Yes, I have a couple of them, truly precision machined. But you can't walk into Cheapo Depot and find something like that. No big deal. Film almost never sits square in a holder, and walls are rarely truly vertical. When it comes to something relatively cheap, a pendulum style angle finder works better than a level, and is lighter weight.

[Alan Klein]

I use one of these with my 4x5. Seems accurate enough. I don't use it as shown but lay it flat on the standard on any edge that shows the best bubble.
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produ...ble_Level.html

I also have an app in my Samsung Galaxy cellphone. You can set the phone as a torpedo level. Just how accurate are the levels in cellphones?

[Michael R]

I’ve never really understood the point of bubble levels on photo equipment. You can spend all the money you want on the most precise level, and spend all day levelling your stuff, but nothing you’re photographing is ever perfectly level, or if it is, it is out of square with something else, or you aren’t perfectly square to the thing, etc. unless all you photograph are horizons on bodies of water, in which case you can easily eyeball it, use your ground glass grid, or just fix it when you print.

[Vaughn]

Levels: For ease of set-up and getting the camera semi-level without having to look at an image on the GG. And I have been in many situations where level was nowhere obvious, so it can be nice to start level and then go from there. Sometimes I like to know which tree is actually perfectly vertical (if any). I have cameras with levels and cameras without them...prefer having them. Like grids on the GG -- some like them, some don't. Whatever floats one's boat.

Level becomes very important with reflections, hanging vines, water falling, and that sort of thing. Unless one has a digital step in there somewhere, fixing it when printing costs image area, and one may not have any to give up. I contact print full-frame, so it is something I need to closely look at.

Two 5x7 negatives, pt/pd print below. On a 3-way Bogen head. I like ballheads but panorama/multiple shots like this are a little easier on a 3-way vs a ball, but a ballhead with separate pan controls are not difficult.

[Alan Klein]

I’ve never really understood the point of bubble levels on photo equipment. You can spend all the money you want on the most precise level, and spend all day levelling your stuff, but nothing you’re photographing is ever perfectly level, or if it is, it is out of square with something else, or you aren’t perfectly square to the thing, etc. unless all you photograph are horizons on bodies of water, in which case you can easily eyeball it, use your ground glass grid, or just fix it when you print.

That happens with wide-angle lenses. Of course, if you use digital after scanning, you can correct for lens distortion afterward.

I agree that my eye is more accurate for leveling than a bullseye level, probably to under 1 degree. I just can't figure out how to get the tripod legs to adjust right. Does anyone have suggestions?

[Drew Wiley]

I just do it spontaneously. Don't even think about it. Someone would probably have to watch me, and then it would be obvious. Helps that my father was a surveyor on his first Govt job, and taught me with an old-school brass transit atop maple legs. That's why I'm perfectly comfortable with no tripod head at all. Takes some practice first, of course. But I've also sold a lot of survey lasers and auto-levels, so understand what it means to actually level a piece of equipment, which absolutely none of those little camera shop cubes or bubble levels are accurate enough for. Actual machinists mini-levels are not only quite expensive, but are intentionally damn difficult to level because they're meant to either be spot on or look conspicuously off. I still have the original intact bubble levels on my Sinar Norma, and still routinely ignore them. The groundglass itself tells me everything I need to know.