Recommended Travel Friendly Macro Tripod

maggiemole wrote:

..Bobby2Shots wrote:

EarthMurmurs wrote:

I am an avid fungi photographer. My goal is to take shots as close to ground level as possible, to show a perspective unseen by humans who tower over these small, fascinating organisms.

To achieve this, I have a tripod with the centre column inverted, which allows my camera to be at ground level, and very stable to set up 10-20 shots on manual focus, which are then stacked when I get home.

This does mean operating the camera upside down, which takes some learning. Fortunately my camera has tilting display, so I do my focusing and metering from the screen.

Hello EarthMurmurs,

There's no need to shoot upside-down if you have an L-bracket for your camera. Using the same set-up you're using now,,, with the column inverted,,, just drop the ballhead's top-plate into its' 90* portrait-notch, then attach the side of your L-bracket to the ballheads' quick-release.

Bobby, could you post a photo of this set-up, please? I’m having a hard time (actually total failure) visualising it. I’ve never used an L-bracket which might be the reason. Let alone a balhead with bracket attached, I always see them attached to the camera. I really don't like shooting upside-down, and have been playing with the mirror solution proposed by Beatsy. This works for small flowers (thank you, Beatsy!) but I think the L-bracket might offer more compositions for larger mushroom groups.

Many thanks.

Hello Maggiemole,

I've been searching Youtube for the last few hours, and haven't found an appropriate video just yet,,, but I'll keep looking, and I'll post it here when I do find it.

That said, I'm going to show you a few videos on what L-brackets are, and how they work.

In order for my explanation to make sense to you,, it would be helpful to know what tripod you're presently using. I need to know if your tripods' center column can be inverted. Second, I'd need to know which ballhead you're using (does it have a 90-degree drop-notch (for mounting the camera in portrait mode). It's also helpful to have panning ability in the ballheads' base,,, but that is optional at this point.

Now, an L-bracket is simply a 90-degree Arca-Swiss type plate that attaches to the bottom of your camera. The plate runs along the bottom of your camera and up one side. Your camera can be repositioned from horizontal (landscape mode) to vertical (portrait mode) simply by detaching and re-attaching the mounted L-bracket to your ballheads' quick-release plate, in whatever orientation you prefer, simply by rotating the camera-body.

Note; this will not work with ballheads that don't allow for longer Arca-Swiss plates,,, such as many of the Manfrotto heads that use a proprietary small square "trapped plate" design.

Here's the L-bracket videos;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbjDO0iNGL0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4J9ZZchurU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1QhF72XOHME