How to set up a tripod

<p>What is the quickest way to set up a tripod? I don't think this is a silly as it sounds! Recently, I was fighting with my tripod, trying to get the head in correct height position for an appx 4 foot high shot and kept thinking there must be a better way to do this. <br>

I have been holding the head appx where I want it, and with the legs still closed, dropping one leg and locking it. Then setting the other two to match and opening the legs. I try not to raise the center post, but adjust the legs if I need more height. Same if I need to lower the head.<br>

After watching some other people struggle with their tripods, I realized I'm not the only one who has problems doing this!<br>

Is there a "correct" way? What method do you use?</p>

<p>If there is little or no wind I have no issue with using the centre column to fine tune the height by a few inches - it is a damned site easier than messing around with the legs. If it is windy then I adjust the legs.<br>

If you are talking about levelling the tripod, then levelling heads are available but they are in my view excessively expensive. So I stay with the ball head.</p>

<p>Do it a lot, and it will become second nature. More to the point, you don't have to be perfect about it ... just get it close, and use your ballhead (with a spirit level, if you like) to get the camera itself square to the earth.</p>

I try to use complex geometry and trigonometry and once I realize (again) that I'm not smart enough to do that on the fly, I just guess and make do (effectively what Matt said).

 

--Wade

<p>Ditto on what Matt said.</p>

<p>I do it the same way you described Dave. But as Matt always says more eloquently than I: Practice makes perfect (or at least a bit faster).</p>

<p>Start a photography intern program. Recruit college students willing to lug gear for you. Make tripod setup a high priority and tell them to train for 5 hours a day on speed and accuracy. Yell and pout if they don't do it right. </p>

<p>I don't do that much shooting with a tripod, but I tend to release all the leg sections (except the smallest ones if I don't think I'll need them) and then hold the head where I want it, and shake until everything hits the ground. I then make sure the upper sections are more extended than the lower ones and clamp everything down. I reverse by releasing everything, folding the legs together, and shaking the tripod upside down until the legs have collapsed. I have a Manfrotto tripod, which has lever leg clamps; I might have more of a faff with trist grips like Gitzo's. If you want a tripod that's <i>interesting</i> to set up, try setting up a Velbon 777 on an uneven surface (lovely bit of kit, but...)<br />

<br />

Someone (Manfrotto or Gitzo, I forget) makes a tripod with the leg releases controlled at the top; you can get all the leg sections to drop without fiddling with multiple clamps. Sadly, it's not very tall and it's very expensive, but it feels like "the way forward". Tripods are on my list of "things I'd spend time building a decent one of" if I won a lottery (combining the release-at-the-top mechanism with the outer-legs-are-largest environment proofing designs - although I've not yet worked out how to get the small leg sections to extend last, because gravity wouldn't work; probably some kind of variable friction arrangement). A tripod head which combines the ability to move a ball head and the ability to crank-control a three-way head is also on my things-to-invent list (I've not even vaguely worked out how to do that yet, short of actually mounting a geared head on a ball head, but something tells me a harmonic gear would be involved).</p>

<blockquote>Someone (Manfrotto or Gitzo, I forget) makes a tripod with the leg releases controlled at the top</blockquote>

 

<p>Manfrotto, the "neotec" series. I've no idea whether they're any good, but they were too short and expensive for my requirements.</p>

<p>My 2 cents to add to what Matt and others said--I've added a couple marks (use indelible pen, paint, nail polish, etc.) to mark off a couple of"standard" heights on each leg. I do use them sometimes---- mine are set for a comfortable kneeling height and a "standing-slightly-stooped-over-so-I-can-still-see-the-top-plate-of the-camera" height. Ballhead gets things level. I'm much happier now that I've quit pretending that I liked/was good at macro shooting. Landscape is so much more tripod-friendly. You don't need absolute precision and the legs can be different lengths if <em><strong>THEY </strong></em>want to.</p>

<p>I always just guesstimated how many of the leg extensions to pull out, and then fine tuned with the centrepost. It seemed to work for many years until the internet came along to forbid touching the centrepost.</p>

It's usually straightforward, but it's tricky when you know that you want the camera in a particular spot. You probably

found that spot while hand holding the camera. Now you are trying to hold the camera in that position while unlocking,

positioning, and re-locking the tripod legs. That's a tough challenge. Practice will help, as Matt suggests, but this

operation is never easy.

 

Also tricky is setting up the tripod on an uneven or rocky surface or in soft ground.

 

Try to make sure that the top is level at all times. Some tripods and/or heads have a built-in bubble level. Use it.

 

Make sure that nothing has become loose. Tighten everything that turns, and do this repeatedly and obsessively. You

don't want your camera to fall to the ground because something worked loose.

<p>Tripod wrangling is an art if it is to help photography rather than hinder it. As an art it worthy of wilful study. How many people actually practice setting up a tripod? Not many I should think but I do. I shoot 8x10 and I need the tripod to be set right <strong>before</strong> I go and get the camera. Moving the set-up after everything is connected is downright awkward.</p>

<p>Step one is deciding where in space the camera lens is going to be. I often use a viewing card for this. Then I get the tripod, place my chin on the tripod head, and my eye represents where the camera lens will be. The <strong>front</strong> leg of the tripod is extended <em>toward the subject</em> and locked. The final adjustment done with the upper leg lock because this is the one I can reach without bending down.</p>

<p>The <strong>right</strong> and <strong>left</strong> tripod legs are then pulled out and down and locked off so the top plate of the tripod is level. If the top plate is not level the picture will tilt if you pan. I stand in the space between the right and left tripod legs. This gets me conveniently close to the camera without the danger of kicking a tripod leg and ruining the composition or introducing camera shake.</p>

<p>Finally I go and get the camera and set it to the top of the tripod. If I've done things right there is scarcely anything more to do other than focus and shoot.</p>

<p>I haven't hand-held a shot with any camera since 1977 and if I ever get tempted I remind myself of the deadly but true adage "The sharpest lens in the camera bag is the tripod."</p>

<p>Don't forget that spreading the legs wider will lower the top of the tripod. I find that useful for quick leveling.</p>

<p>Thanks everyone for you input! Special thanks to Maris...exactly what I was looking for!<br>

Thanks again!</p>

<p>I don't think there's a "correct" way. Your current practice of guess-timation works for me.</p>

<p>There is one way which is odd looking but faster. And I've done it when I didn't have the space, or was lazy. Adjust the lengths of the legs as if they were monopods, then don't spread the legs. Looks silly, but it does serve the purpose of helping you stabilize the camera.</p>

<p>A thought. You didn't mention if you had a quick release head for your tripod, and quick release plate(s) for your camera(s). To me, the additional cost is very very well worth it. You know you want to use your tripod, and the quick release setup feels much easier than no quick release setup. Mind over matter.</p>

<p>Happy New Year.</p>

<p>I work alot with the landscape and how level it is. Which it never is! I just adjust the tripod's legs until the camera is level for the shot. However, I have a question - how do I adjust for being vertically challenged? There have been some times when the tripod was correctly adjust and I could not see through the camera's viewfinder - new problem!</p>

<p>a camera with live view?</p>

<blockquote>There have been some times when the tripod was correctly adjust and I could not see through the camera's viewfinder - new problem!</blockquote>

 

<p>Karlisa: That doesn't sound correctly-adjusted to me! (Unless you really want a high vantage point, in which case you need live view or a stepladder...)<br />

<br />

I have a tripod that can put the viewfinder above my eye level; that's deliberate, because I sometimes want to shoot the sky (looking up through the viewfinder), and don't want to have to lie down to do it. The rest of the time, I just don't extend the legs fully - and remember it's the thinnest leg section that you should part-extend. If you're never using the height (and don't forget you might set up the tripod below you on a hill...) you could always consider replacing the tripod with a shorter one, to save you carrying the unnecessary weight of a big tripod.</p>