Day 219, 2013 - Tripod
I have a large heavy quality tripod that is great for shooting long exposure stuff because it stays put. I also had an old "cheap" one from many many years ago, like more than a decade, that I loved. It was small, lightweight, and cheap from then was far better than some of the midgrade cheaper stuff today. Unfortunately, just like Humpty Dumpty, it had a great fall and all the Kings horses and all the Kings men could not put Humpty Dumpty or my tripod back together again. So yesterday my wife bought me a new portable cheap tripod to replace it. What set this one apart from all the other cheap ones is that the legs were much better built. Sadly, like so many others, even though rated for the weight the camera would slowly creep/rotate down under the weight of the lens when shooting vertical.
Tripod is a Promaster 7050 ($39.99). The legs met my needs. Small, lightweight, and easy to transport. However, as I said earlier, the head flat sucked. For some reason, which I will never know why, they quit putting that little 3/16" pin hole in the bottom of cameras for the tripod mount to lock the camera in place and prevent it from rotating when shooting vertically with a heavy lens and the Promaster mount was no different. Heck, we tested some of the tripods at three times the price and they did it as well. So with the new tripod we replaced the head to a Promaster SystemPRO Ball Head.
The Promaster SystemPRO Ball Head ($39.99) has a mounting plate that allows for better centering under the whole of the bottom of the camera and keeps it in place really well. Greater surface area contact, greater friction/grip, and no rotation when vertically mounted. Of course, the mount has the pin that the camera doesn't have the hole for... grrr.
The tripod is obviously not a high end take any abuse tripod, but it fills the need for that lightweight don't want to lug a brick or worry about it need. The new head is a bit of brick, it's a solid chunk of metal and will survive anything. Together they weigh about 3.5 lbs (1.6 kg).
So now when I go on my Goblin Valley Milky Way shoot I can run both cameras.
If you're not familiar with Goblin Valley here is a link that shows some pictures:
Google Image Result for http://www.utah.com/images/lf/panoGoblinValley.jpg
Thank you MoabLady for the new tripod.
