[Leica] Wooden tripods

[mark at rabinergroup.com (Mark Rabiner)]

Weight is a funny thing with tripods as it is with pots and pans or other
gear.
You pay more for that wonderful useful added weight.
Wood, or huge metal Gitzos.
Or you can pay more for that wonderful useful light weight.
Carbon resin you name it. "Stealth" tripods I call them. Or "Golf club"
tripods.

There are occasions when you want the heaviest biggest tripod you can find.
And yes that can be for 35mm work too because if you have that thing jacked
up to eye level with no motor drive that's a long long way to the ground!
And every inch off the ground makes for a bigger engineering design feat in
terms of working with a camera. A heavy OR light camera.
In a way a light camera needs some extra weight to keep it in place not the
other way around like they have you think.

The biggest metal Gitzo I bought when I got into 4x5 I ended up using for
very single shoot I did in the studio on the white backdrop in 35mm.
As eye level works really needed that kind of build.

So as always its always what you don't think.

A very lightweight tripod  you get for travel or small format you end up
using for waist high folding finder medium finder stuff.
Things that low to the ground are easy. They can be made out of anything and
be designed not all that greatly.

So your light tripods you use for bigger film and the heavy tripods you use
for small film as the camera is hovering right in front of your face!



Sometimes you want a very heavy fry pan.
Sometimes you want a real lightweight one.



Mark William Rabiner
markrabiner.com