Which Tripod Should You Buy?

One of these is essential for many types of photography, whether you are using a digital SLR camera or a camcorder.

A Tripod Has Two Basic Parts:

• Go ahead, holding the camera, and
• One leg set

Cheap and Best Lightweight Travel Tripods Reviews that cost less than $ 100 usually have tripod heads and legs sold together as a single unit. You do not buy them piece by piece. Usually, you cannot change heads in these cheaper tripods. The most expensive ones often have legs and heads that you can change depending on what you are doing.

Tripod Head

When considering your purchase, you should think about your head and how it moves, and also how much weight you will have. A two-way head is the most basic type. It allows you to move the camera up and down, and to the left and to the right. A three-way head will also allow you to flip the camera to one side or the other. This is useful if you want to move from a horizontal frame to a vertical frame. You can also use this function to take pictures or videos under the tripod.

One mistake that many people make is that they select a Mefoto Roadtrip Tripod Monopod Kit and a head that is not stable enough for their camera and what they want to do. The heavier your camera is, the more critical it is that your tripod is strong and stable.

On the head, a 1 / 4X20 thread size is standard on virtually all cameras. Therefore, any tripod you buy should thread correctly in your camera.

Tripod Legs

Most leg assemblies will move up and down to give you several height options. However, the number of heights a leg can handle can be limited. You can not hold a tripod of regular size to be as small as a compact one. The more leg sections there are in the device, the less stable it is in general. Most of the full size have sections of three or four legs maximum. Carbon fiber is generally used these days due to its great strength, stability, inflexibility, and lightweight.

The legs of a tripod are removed and then locked in place with a variety of mechanisms. The most reliable locks are the wingnuts or the rotating collars that you must tighten for each leg. This may be too slow for some purposes. There are also lever locks available. These are very durable if they are of high quality. However, lever locks on low-cost tripods are often not reliable.

Recommendation

A tripod we recommend is the Gitzo GT5561SGT Series 5 Carbon 6X Giant Systematic Tripod 6 Sec G-Lock. This device has an anti-leg rotation system. This allows you to open the tripod in less than 15 seconds. All you have to do is loosen all the torsion blocks on each leg at the same time. Then pull the legs down and tighten the locks. The leg locking system in this provides a 20% increase in stiffness and better blocking.

The G-Lock feature on this tripod means that the more weight is applied to the leg, the more stable and durable the lock is. The legs are made of 1 mm carbon fiber and are very strong, stable and lightweight. The load capacity of this tripod is 55 pounds so it will handle a heavy video camera with ease.

Learn more about tripods by visiting us at: Gitzo GT1542T Traveler Tripod Review