What tripod do you use and aren't many identical?

Hi I recently bought me a Rollei Traveller tripod. Nice, light and easy to use. Good for traveling. I have an E-M1.2 and a GH4 so they tend to be less heavy than their DSLr counterparts.

But I shoot timelapse with the GH4 and pics with the E-M1.2 on quite a few occassions (say noctilucent clouds). So I like to have another one. Also: the traveller is great for light weight but it is not as stable as a heavier or may be better designed produt. After all this tripod only costed about 90 euro's or so so you can't expect too much.

So now I found a Rollei C50i (aluminium or carbon) which ahs been replaced by the C5i. Which is te exact same tripod but cheaper and comes with only one Arca plate instead of two with the 50.

Looking into this closer It seems to me they are all made by the same manufacturer and I guess it is Sirui but may be Sirui is not the manufacturer but one of them. Does not matter.

Is this true, have you noted or has someone found an article how Rollei=Mefoto=Sirui=K&F=Geekphoto etcetc. The balheads all look identical too. But are they?

I am leaning towards the carbon fiber ones like these but then again they are lightweight. The aluminium ones are about 300-400 grams heavier.

I am looking at these:

Geekphoto carbon

Zomei…

Rollei C5i carbon

Apart from that: any recommendations under 150 euro/dollar?? Thx!

Jorginho wrote:

Hi I recently bought me a Rollei Traveller tripod. Nice, light and easy to use. Good for traveling. I have an E-M1.2 and a GH4 so they tend to be less heavy than their DSLr counterparts.

But I shoot timelapse with the GH4 and pics with the E-M1.2 on quite a few occassions (say noctilucent clouds). So I like to have another one. Also: the traveller is great for light weight but it is not as stable as a heavier or may be better designed produt. After all this tripod only costed about 90 euro's or so so you can't expect too much.

So now I found a Rollei C50i (aluminium or carbon) which ahs been replaced by the C5i. Which is te exact same tripod but cheaper and comes with only one Arca plate instead of two with the 50.

Looking into this closer It seems to me they are all made by the same manufacturer and I guess it is Sirui but may be Sirui is not the manufacturer but one of them. Does not matter.

Is this true, have you noted or has someone found an article how Rollei=Mefoto=Sirui=K&F=Geekphoto etcetc. The balheads all look identical too. But are they?

I am leaning towards the carbon fiber ones like these but then again they are lightweight. The aluminium ones are about 300-400 grams heavier.

I am looking at these:

Geekphoto carbon

Zomei…

Rollei C5i carbon

Apart from that: any recommendations under 150 euro/dollar?? Thx!

I was going to buy a carbon fiber tripod but one of my colleagues, photog and structures engineer in the aerospace industry, suggested I'd go for the alluminium version as  whilst being heavier is more durable.

Carbon fiber isn't 'repairable' and in case of 'incident' it'll break eventually...

So I decided to follow hie advice and purchased a Zomei Z688.

I am glad I did. It is quite solid and breaks down to a monopod. I believe I got it on sale for about 60€, shipped.

Can't really complaint.

Jorginho wrote:

Hi I recently bought me a Rollei Traveller tripod. Nice, light and easy to use. Good for traveling. I have an E-M1.2 and a GH4 so they tend to be less heavy than their DSLr counterparts.

But I shoot timelapse with the GH4 and pics with the E-M1.2 on quite a few occassions (say noctilucent clouds). So I like to have another one. Also: the traveller is great for light weight but it is not as stable as a heavier or may be better designed produt. After all this tripod only costed about 90 euro's or so so you can't expect too much.

So now I found a Rollei C50i (aluminium or carbon) which ahs been replaced by the C5i. Which is te exact same tripod but cheaper and comes with only one Arca plate instead of two with the 50.

Looking into this closer It seems to me they are all made by the same manufacturer and I guess it is Sirui but may be Sirui is not the manufacturer but one of them. Does not matter.

Is this true, have you noted or has someone found an article how Rollei=Mefoto=Sirui=K&F=Geekphoto etcetc. The balheads all look identical too. But are they?

I am leaning towards the carbon fiber ones like these but then again they are lightweight. The aluminium ones are about 300-400 grams heavier.

I am looking at these:

Geekphoto carbon

Zomei…

Rollei C5i carbon

Apart from that: any recommendations under 150 euro/dollar?? Thx!

Tripod performance is a very subtle topic.

One of the issues (the key issue IMO) is the tendancy for the tripod and camera to vibrate after it is disturbed (for example by your hand touching it to adjust focus). I had a big sturdy Manfrotto that would vibrate very subtly for over 6 seconds after being touched. You would not notice it unless you were carefully looking at the image in the LCD.

IMO its the vibration that is the most prevalent cause blur.

If you make a quick test of the stiffness of the assembly, you will find that the structure controls left to right movement and front to back movement fairly well, however, movements that rotate the camera and lens about the vertical axis (the center column) are not so well controllled.

If you look at the tripod design thinking as an engineer or physicist (easy for me!), the control of rotation depends a lot on strong leg joints (leg section to secttion, and leg to spider), as well as very stiff legs. The duration of vibration depends on the damping in the system, how quickly energy is absorbed, which is materials choice. Properly chosen Carbon Fiber can damp vibrations better than aluminum.

There is a website where the author reports measurements of the tendency of various tripod models to vibrate. I highly reccomend a review of his findings.

The Center Column

I discuss my tripod selection on my gear list.

Very interesting data.  I have a Manfrotto 190XProB, the predecessor of the Pro3.

I've recently had the center column horizontal, over a light table, photographing slides taken by my father.  As such, radial vibration is noticeable. However - I find it easy to avoid.  Since it is a sharp resonance the trick is not to excite it.  Press the shutter release gently and release the camera slowly and gently.  If you can do that, 2 second delay is clearly enough ... mostly because you didn't excite the resonant frequency.  If you do bonk the camera sideways, then 2s almost certainly wouldn't be enough to allow the back and forth vibration to damp out.

By being careful, I'm having very good success.  If anyone expresses doubt I have hundreds of examples I can show already, and about another 200 slides to go.

My impression is that you can get 80-90% of the utility out of a cheap tripod, and the multiples of price is really for the last few percent of safety.

You're photographing an olympic sports competition - what risk is acceptable that the tripod head suddenly moves much easier than you're used to and overshoots, causing a lost few seconds?

You're driving with a camera and tripod across Africa - someone brings you something heavy and throws it into your car - what chance is acceptable that a tripod joint breaks from the impact?

Like the "pro" cameras vs "enthusiast" cameras, you are paying a lot for a bit because the last bit might be what you need.

I've never had any issue at all using cheap tripods, but then I have never done any life-critical photography.

Felice62 wrote:

Jorginho wrote:

Hi I recently bought me a Rollei Traveller tripod. Nice, light and easy to use. Good for traveling. I have an E-M1.2 and a GH4 so they tend to be less heavy than their DSLr counterparts.

But I shoot timelapse with the GH4 and pics with the E-M1.2 on quite a few occassions (say noctilucent clouds). So I like to have another one. Also: the traveller is great for light weight but it is not as stable as a heavier or may be better designed produt. After all this tripod only costed about 90 euro's or so so you can't expect too much.

So now I found a Rollei C50i (aluminium or carbon) which ahs been replaced by the C5i. Which is te exact same tripod but cheaper and comes with only one Arca plate instead of two with the 50.

Looking into this closer It seems to me they are all made by the same manufacturer and I guess it is Sirui but may be Sirui is not the manufacturer but one of them. Does not matter.

Is this true, have you noted or has someone found an article how Rollei=Mefoto=Sirui=K&F=Geekphoto etcetc. The balheads all look identical too. But are they?

I am leaning towards the carbon fiber ones like these but then again they are lightweight. The aluminium ones are about 300-400 grams heavier.

I am looking at these:

Geekphoto carbon

Zomei…

Rollei C5i carbon

Apart from that: any recommendations under 150 euro/dollar?? Thx!

I was going to buy a carbon fiber tripod but one of my colleagues, photog and structures engineer in the aerospace industry, suggested I'd go for the alluminium version as whilst being heavier is more durable.

Carbon fiber isn't 'repairable' and in case of 'incident' it'll break eventually...

So I decided to follow hie advice and purchased a Zomei Z688.

I am glad I did. It is quite solid and breaks down to a monopod. I believe I got it on sale for about 60€, shipped.

Can't really complaint.

The aluminium version was 50 euro cheaper, not much heavier (250 gram) and it did not have any spikes. Both have this option to scrw a leg lose and make a monopod out of it. Also the height is important. They go to 1.60 m which is about right for me. Might be a little higher. They also had MeFoto, Sirui, Leo....., Manfrotto and cullman. The ones that looked alike were virtually indistinguishable from oneanother and the salesman said while he could not be sure he had the exact same feeling these all come from the same manufacturer. Only Sirui offers 5 yr warranty and Rollei 2 yrs which is the minimum they can give due to EUR regulations.

tonight here is a good chance for NLCs, I will shoot with the D800E, the Em1.2  and GH4. Fortunately it is no 10 C with a lot of wind, but 20 C with little wind at mid night. I just hope the noctilucent clouds will be here like they have been the last couple of days...

Having recently moved up from the em-10 iii to the em-1 ii, the limitations of the Rollei Traveller Carbon became too much. While I was carrying it I loved it but as soon as I set it up I hated the fact that it is just so flimsy. I just bought the Sirui 3204x at $200 off the normal price and it‘s a quantum leap. I‘m 1.80m tall and it‘s no problem for me to use without extending the centre column. Though I may change my mind after hiking with it. I shot this yesterday evening on the Côte d‘Azur with the Olympus 50-200 SWD.

Moon, Seagull, Jupiter.

I bought the C5i. I like to stick to a certain budget and I set it to 150 euro max. This is due to the fact that I have an EM1.2 which has great stabilisation and I only use a tripod for Hires mode. I used to use a 100 euro Manfrotto and it already gave me perfectly sharp shots, but it failed after 4 yrs. I did not like how it functioned. I tried out various versions of this C5i in several shops and at least it seems to be a whole lot better with a much better ballhead etc.

If this one failes I will buy one that is much better if so. But with the pretty occasional use I have for it (like now, shooting at night for 1-10 second exposures0) I hope it suffices.

It is a help and even though I already have one i can still exchange it, so if you have more information or personal experiences yourself with some of the similar tripods like the C5i etc it would still be helpful. Thx!

Jorginho wrote:

I bought the C5i. I like to stick to a certain budget and I set it to 150 euro max. This is due to the fact that I have an EM1.2 which has great stabilisation and I only use a tripod for Hires mode. I used to use a 100 euro Manfrotto and it already gave me perfectly sharp shots, but it failed after 4 yrs. I did not like how it functioned. I tried out various versions of this C5i in several shops and at least it seems to be a whole lot better with a much better ballhead etc.

If this one failes I will buy one that is much better if so. But with the pretty occasional use I have for it (like now, shooting at night for 1-10 second exposures0) I hope it suffices.

I was using the C4i and replaced it with the Siruii T-1205X w/ K10 ball head. Not entirely sure the Sirui is better that the C4i (the ball head is very good) but it certainly is easier to carry. I got a good deal but it is more than you budget.

JosephScha wrote:

Very interesting data. I have a Manfrotto 190XProB, the predecessor of the Pro3.

I've recently had the center column horizontal, over a light table, photographing slides taken by my father. As such, radial vibration is noticeable. However - I find it easy to avoid. Since it is a sharp resonance the trick is not to excite it. Press the shutter release gently and release the camera slowly and gently. If you can do that, 2 second delay is clearly enough ... mostly because you didn't excite the resonant frequency. If you do bonk the camera sideways, then 2s almost certainly wouldn't be enough to allow the back and forth vibration to damp out.

By being careful, I'm having very good success. If anyone expresses doubt I have hundreds of examples I can show already, and about another 200 slides to go.

I was using the 055XProB, the larger and heavier version of the 190XProB, and did not like how careful I had to be to avoid trigger vibrations. Not only did I have to be very careful touching the shutter, It would also vibrate if anyone walked on the floor. I couuld have decided to use it only on a concrete floor, and be vaery careful - I decided that it just didn't meet my needs.

I tried the 190XProB and didn't find it any better.

I found an Induro CT214 Carbon Fiber tripod on sale, and am using it with a  Sirui K30 ball head. Very satisfied with this.

In 2004 I bought a Gitzo Carbon Fiber 3-section tripod that I probably paid $500, and with it I bought a Markins M10 ballhead that probably cost another $400!  I will say that both the tripod and ballhead have performed flawlessly for the last 15 years, and supported everything I've thrown at them without slipping or vibrating.

It's a combo that I bought for my Nikon gear, so it's probably more than is required for m4/3, but I've appreciated it for several reasons:

• The carbon fiber makes it light and not unpleasant to use in cold weather
• It extends and folds up rapidly and easily
• The height allows me to shoot comfortably without raising the center column (which reduces stability)
• The tripod's carbon fiber legs are thick enough to be stable and stiff... and dampen vibrations very well.
• The Markins head holds even my heaviest combos without slipping one bit. 

As solid as this combo is, it can't convert to a monopod! I had to purchase that separately. It also doesn't fold up as small as a 4-section tripod. I own an aluminum and plastic Gitzo traveler tripod that does fold up nice and compact, but it doesn't get very tall and the last section (plastic) is pencil thin and not very stable.

I'm amazed that these days you can buy a carbon fiber tripod that converts to monopod and has a decent looking ballhead for less than $200. Maybe they don't dampen as well as the Gitzo, and maybe they don't hold heavy lenses as well as the Markins, but for the price they are sure worth trying!

Read reviews of the ballhead... you want to make sure it works well and doesn't slip out of position under weight or movement. Also pay attention to the thickness of the tripod legs. If the tripod is lighter because the sections are thinner (especially that last section) you will have a tripod that flexes too much.

4-section tripods fold up nice and small, but it's another three sections to extend or collapse every time you deploy it and pack it. I bought my 4-section for times when I need it to fit into a small bag. Outside of that I prefer using my 3-section pod for the stability and the easy of deployment.

I have a Zomie Z688, that also makes into a monopod. By far it’s the most used, because it’s lightest.

But I also have a big, heavy beast that just said Amazon Basics. It’s better, because it’s way heavier, with a better fluid head. But it stays home more than anything, collecting dust.

If you had to have just one, buy the lighter one.

Are all tripods the same?

They work about the same.

The idea is a stable platform to hold your camera.

There should be a law, they all must use the same mount, though.

Jorginho wrote:

Apart from that: any recommendations under 150 euro/dollar?? Thx!

What's the longest lens you intend to use on your camera?

My largest tripod is a Vanguard Auctus Plus 323CT with a Benro B3 ball head or a Manfrotto 3-way head.  That setup can handle a 4x5" view camera, my Pentax 645, or a Nikon dSLR with a 500mm lens.  It's complete and total overkill for my own m43 use.

I also have two travel tripods.  The first is a Benro C1182 Travel Flat II, which I don't believe is still made.  It's flat design makes it easy to stuff into the pocket of a suitcase even of carry-on size.  I use it with a Markins Q10 ball head.  If I'm travelling by air with both Nikon and m43 gear, it's what I'll bring, even though it's undersized for longer Nikon mount lenses.

I also have a 3 Legged Thing "Leo," which my wife bought me for Christmas a couple or years back.  It's smaller still, and it would be by choice today for an m43 only trip.

Finally, I have a TrekPod Go!, which replaced a Gitzo MonoTrek.  The magnetic mount was too weak for a dSLR, but it's fine for a GX85.  I use that as a walking stick/monopod, but the bottom section does open up into three small legs for a little extra stability.

Of the three that you are looking at, both the Zomei and the Rollei have a maximum leg diameter of 22 cm.  That's probably okay for something like my 45-150mm lens, but a little too small for anything longer.  The Geekoto is a considerably larger tripod with a maximum leg diameter (I think) of 25cm.  That puts it more in line with my C1182T.

Something worth noting. The spider material. Is is cast or machined? And what grade of metal do they use?

If you're going to spend on a tripod, get the best materials. One overlooked area is the spider, or the plate which has the 3 legs mounted and the screw for the head. Depending on the spider it can wear or crack if made of cheap light weight aluminium. It's on of the areas that break before the legs do. And, the spider is a major part for the payload capacity. Weak ones are usually cast vs, aircraft grade machined spiders which when designed right can have a larger payload capacity.

For me the Feisol Tournament 3342, has enough payload for the MFT system.

My first was a Manfrotto 3021. Still have it, still use it when I go to places like the beach, because it’s mostly seized up. It’s my beater.

Depending on application, I have 4 main tripods:

Giant Induro, I think it’s a 505XL. It goes about 9 or 10 feet high with the column maxed, and I have a right angle arm that swaps out instantly. I use it on location to shoot architecture and overhead table scenes so my stylist doesn’t have to work on the floor and people can walk underneath it. I’d say this tripod is OKAY. It’s kind of fragile, the center column gearing is pretty awful. Warrantied it twice in 4 years. In retrospect, I should have bought the Gitzo flavor of the same sticks.

Medium Gitzo, carbon fiber, older, goes about 6 feet up. Stronger than the giant Induro. This is my favorite tripod and is the one I use when the Induro is overkill, or when I need to put the laptop on sticks.

Baby Gitzo, I think a 1540T. Folds up to about 14”, perfect for day trips, personal stuff, and when I need to put the Camera in a sink or on a counter shooting architecture. Handles a D4 no sweat.

Tiny Manfrotto, the 209! Love this guy, super strong, awesome for when I need to put the camera in spots where the small Gitzo is too big.

At home, I have a Benro Tripster. It sucks, It folds up to about 14” like the Baby Gitzo, but it’s a hunk of garbage. Movements that crate vibrations never chill out. The 40-150 is unusable on it. This is the only set of sticks where I have to use the 12 second self timer. Cannot recommend. The ballhead droops when I tighten it.

Most important though I’d say are the heads. In my experience it’s Really Right Stuff, or go home. If you need a geared head, the Manfrotto 410 is about as good as you’re going to get without going to “THE CUBE”. My Baby Gitzo and the 201 share a BH-30, the bigger ones share a BH-55 or the 410 geared head.

I can see myself replacing the Giant Induro in the future, but that’s it. Good tripods are the one thing you buy ONCE.

I’ve learned over the years that you should spend a ton of money on sticks, it’s 100% worth it.