Fibre Tripod
The first steps in choosing a tripod
As any photographer will happily inform you, a steady hand is vital if you want to take pin sharp photographs. Now some photographers will be capable of hand holding their camera and lens (weight dependant) steady, well steady enough to get the photo they are looking for; but, the rest of us, well this is not always possible especially when working with long exposure times. This is where good support for your camera becomes important, and this is where we turn to monopods, tripods or bean bags.
There are an awful lot of manufacturers of camera supports (a comprehensive list can be found here on the fatphotographer website) and these producers have many varied styles of tripods and monopods as well as specialist head units for them, they come in an array of sizes, and each one is designed for a purpose (combinations of which suits you are easy enough to find). Exactly what will meet your requirements is something you alone can work out (Knowing what kit you have will help the choice). Here are some useful tips to help make this decision; telephoto or long lens users (these are considered lenses of 300mm or greater) will find that a “gimble” head is the best for supporting their large lenses while allowing fluid movement (although these can be very expensive), used on a sturdy tripod for extra stability, however this would not be optimum for photographers who were using a short lens for portraits when the movement capabilities are not important; again the sports photographer may find they do not have the room necessary for a large tripod and would opt instead for a monopod, while again still landscape photographers may want to photograph stunning panoramic images and there are heads designed just for this purpose.
It is not all about tripods and monopods when it comes to supporting your camera, many wildlife photographers I know often prefer to use a small bean bag for support the long lens. They find this can provide them with an easy to transport system, which is easily manoeuvred for them to get into different positions, including very low down or odd angles or where there is no room for any other support, and use what is around them as support, specialist camouflage ones are available in many retailers.
Some of the most important things to remember when selecting you support system are Weight and Stability, I can almost guaranteed that you will be hefting this support system around and you do not want something that is too heavy to carry for long periods, yet it MUST be stable! Carbon fibre tripods have become a popular choice for this very reason as they offer light weights but are very stable, unfortunately they do usually come with a heavy price tag. As you can see, as with almost everything in photography, the choices are vast, and there should be something to suit everyone’s needs and budget.
Links to manufacturers of all kinds of support can be found at the fatphotographer website
About the Author
Having been a birdwatcher all my life and an amateur photographer for much of my adulthood I decided it was time to start using my writing skills to show others what I have learnt, and so my global web resource www.fatphotographer.net was born, (much of my writing can be found there).
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