Heads for every budget - review thread

<p>Sagging balls are a perennial problem for the photographer.<br /> <br /> I've recently acquired some support in an attempt to solve this problem and, since some of the solutions are a little uncommon, I thought sharing my limited experience. (I mentioned a while ago in other threads that I'd do this, so here goes. Apologies if this is not the preferred way to do this kind of thing...)<br /> <br /> By way of background, my historical set-up has been a D700, a Manfrotto 055CXPro3 and - except when my Manfrotto 393 is supporting 500 f/4 - a Giottos 1301-652. That's a medium-range carbon fibre tripod (maybe like a poor man's Gitzo 3-series) and a pretty low-end but otherwise competent ball head with a proprietary quick lever-release plate. I've been happy with both as far as they went, but plans to acquire a 5x4 and my lens calibration stint with my D800E persuaded me that I was due an upgrade. Please take my previous item ownership into account when reading this - I can't claim to have spent the last few years trying the best that Arca-Swiss, Really Right Stuff and Markins have to offer.<br /> <br /> Rather than going for more system-specific mounting solutions, I decided it was time to buy into the Arca-Swiss system, and picked up a Really Right Stuff L-plate for my camera. (Note: "Made in America" is not much of a selling point for me because I'm in the UK, making RRS products only slightly easier to acquire than Arca-Swiss's own.) Other than being a little heavy and pushing my nose a bit to the side when I use the camera hand-held, this is a well-built piece of kit, and I have no complaints about it. I considered the Kirk option - slightly easier to source in the UK - but while I like the fact that it has a lip that embraces the front of the camera to hold it steady (in addition to the lip at the back which both have), I was concerned that it had less contact area than the RRS version when slid to allow cable access. I've not actually tried the Kirk design so I can't vouch for the superiority of either solution.<br /> <br /> I had resolved to get myself a good ball head and a good geared head, since both have their uses on different occasions. My preferred choice of ball head would probably be a Burzynski Pro-Tec, but these have been out of stock at both the French and German suppliers for several months. In the meantime, I heard about the <a href="http://www.triopo.pl/produkt/Triopo+RS-3">Triopo RS-3</a> as a very cheap option, lauded for its weight-bearing ability. I wasn't expecting much, but for less than the cost than some Arca-style lens plates (from EBay) I figured it was worth a trial run.<br /> <br /> My RS-3 turned up with a nice velvet bag (given to my wife for jewellery). It's chubbier than my Giottos head, but impressively light - I measured 310g, which is a bit more than claimed but still dinky - and, as default, has no quick release. The ball is an attractive champagne colour, presumably due to telfon coating or something similar.</p>

<p>That went well. A firewall seems to be getting in the way of my image uploads, which will teach me not to try to do this on a lunch break. I'll try again.</p><div></div>

<p>[Aha. Sorry about that. Where was I...]<br />

<br />

The RS-3 only has the one control lever. It's held on to the hex nut

which controls the clamp amount by a spring, which makes it possible to

move the lever into any of six positions (which means it can clear a

large tripod base if it still has to). There's a small region of the

lever's range in which the head can revolve on its base without the

ball slipping. Ball movement feels a little uneven when manipulated by

hand (as it were), but with extra leverage from mounting a camera on the

top it feels more even, and can be adjusted to provide some resistance.

The stem is reassuringly short and thick (this is one of those reviews,

isn't it?) and when clamped with only moderate finger pressure is a

great deal more solid than my Giottos - capable of withstanding more

torque than I was willing to put through anything I attached to it,

whereas the Giottos would slide under enough pressure. The RS-3 also

seems reasonably good at not drooping after locking, whereas the Giottos

would - as I started by saying - sag when I let go of a heavy lens.</p><div></div>

<p>The ball is spherical (it's no Z1) so it can flop if insufficiently

clamped, but to fit in the drop slot the ball needs to be loosened more

than would be necessary just to move it. Therefore it can't flop fully

just through slippage. Indeed, since the boundary between the ball

rotating and the whole head rotating on the base is so narrow, I see the

ability to rotate the head as being more useful for relocating the slot

than for trying to pan.</p><div></div>

<p>My biggest issue with the RS-3 was the lack of quick release plate.

The default attachment is a conventional screw thread with a rubber ring

below it for anti-slip.</p><div></div>

<p>The ring is only glued to the base in a couple of places, which meant

that the first time I attached a camera, the ring came loose. This

makes the head almost useless, because the camera can rotate freely

on it.</p><div></div>

<p>Fortunately, there is a solution. A Triopo-branded Arca-Swiss clamp

is reasonably cheap (though it brings the total up to the prices of

other cheap ball heads). It has a spring-loaded stud to stop plates from

sliding out, at least in one direction; it compresses under a plate

that has no indent. The clamp came in its own little velvet bag,

again donated to my wife, and with a suitable bolt.</p><div></div>

<p>The double-ended screw in the default head on the RS-3 is held in by

some adhesive. It can be removed by a deep socket wrench that's thin

enough, or by my approach of grabbing the screw thread with pliers and

cranking it. This mangled the screw thread, but I don't intend to

reattach it. There are crenellations on the pillar which slot into

an indent on the bottom of either the circular base provided with the

RS-3, and into the bottom of the Arca-style plate; these ensure that

the clamp is unlikely to unscrew from the column.</p><div></div>

<p>The thumb screw on the Triopo Arca release is centred, making it

relatively easy to centre the clamp on the camera. (I went with

traditional style Arca clamps rather than flip clamps so as to keep

compatibility with third party clamps and plates.)</p><div></div>

<p>The clamp is relatively small, but then we're talking about a

small head. It seems large enough to be stable and grips my RRS

L-plate quickly and firmly. Observe that I haven't learnt which

way around you're supposed to use Arca clamps yet...</p><div></div>

<p>Ah, if that looks familiar it's due to a mis-click while I was sorting out my browsers. Here's the side view of the RS-3 with its default head.</p><div></div>

<p>Sorry about that. Now, having covered the cheap end of the range...<br />

<br />

My other toy was a bit more expensive: An Arca-Swiss D4 (yes, from

a Nikon owning perspective, this is a stupidly confusing name). Here's

a size comparison of the D4, the RS-3 my Giottos head.</p><div></div>

<p>The D4 is obviously much heavier than the ball heads, but it's

tiny compared with the nearest alternative, which is probably the

Manfrotto 405. I would consider the 405 to be a combination geared

and pan/tilt head, in that by pulling the knobs on a 405 the gears

can be disengaged and the head tilted manually to approximately the

desired position. The knobs on the 405 are spring loaded, and so

re-engage the gears (and lock the head) when you let go. With the

D4, the gear disengagement mechanism is not spring loaded, and the

axes of rotation are approximately coincident - unlock all the

controls and the D4 feels like a ball head. Re-lock the gears and

the main axes can be fine tuned (or one can be left unlocked to

implement a pan/tilt head).</p><div></div>

<p>The pear-shaped controls are locks, and rotate to disengage

the gears. The circular controls wind the gears, allowing precise

control.</p><div></div>

<p>The gear knobs are below the axle that they turn, with the

locking "pears" on the end of the axis that they turn. Note that

the knob for the upper ("roll") axis is opposite the lock for

the lower ("pitch") axis, which means that the knob stays in place

as the pitch control changes, but the "axis of roll" is slightly

higher and not quite concentric. The pan for the whole head and

the pan for the QR plate on top are not geared, and have smaller

locking levers. The gears are firm, but not as stiff as I was

worried from previous reviews that they might be. The whole head

seems to lock very securely, but - since slipping would probably

involve damage to the gears - I wasn't willing to try to force it

to learn the limit of lock, unlike the ball heads.<br />

<br />

Something that wasn't obvious to me until I saw it in the flesh

is that there is a rotating base under the obvious extremity of

the head. The bottom (tripod-end) panning lever is fixed in

position relative to the rest of the head - the visible circular

base doesn't move - but an inner base rotates. This means that

the lever doesn't foul on the square hinge arrangement. It can

still foul on the tripod, but since it's loose even in a

horizontal position, that can be avoided by not turning it too

far.</p><div></div>

<p>At the camera end, the panning clamp is again attached to the

tripod and the clamp itself rotates above it. It's unlikely that

the lever would foul anything, but again it doesn't need to be

turned too far. The clamp has a mark to show when the camera

is centred.</p><div></div>

<p>The clamp has a pin underneath which assists in lining up the

orientation with the marks on the head. I avoided a lever release

for compatibility between Arca-compatible plates: For those not

familiar with the Arca-Swiss system, the traditional clamps screw

down onto the quick release plate, which means that they're very

tolerant of slightly different sizes of plate; lever clamps tend

to work only with precise sizes, and not all the manufacturers

of Arca-compatible clamps have agreed on the same size.<br />

<br />

Arca-Swiss offer a clamp in their new "MonoballFix" smaller

plate system, but since my aim in switching to Arca was to have

third-party plate support, I was interested only in the "classic"

system - besides, I kind of prefer the idea of a wider clamp for

leverage. There's no obvious downside to this (other than that it

costs more and took a bit longer to get), because Arca's "classic"

clamp is actually two-tier, and will also clamp their "fix" plates.

I'd considered getting the cheapest D4 version I could and replacing

the clamp with the RRS version, but once I realised I'd need a

panning clamp this became quite expensive. The Arca-Swiss design

seems fine in use. Note that the pillar is offset, but quite

substantial.</p><div></div>

<p>Note that the "safety pins" on the clamp don't engage with anything that fits the traditional style gap.<br />

<br />

I didn't care too much about range of movement, in part because of my L plate. However, the D4 will point past straight

down.</p><div></div>

<p>That said, its sideways movement is a bit more limited and the

controls do foul the base eventually.</p><div></div>

<p>Though the head does reach its limits in some orientations,

the presence of two panning clamps is enough to avoid this being

a major problem in practice. They also mean that my concerns

about whether the head would "gimbal lock" have thus far remained

unfounded.</p>

<p>[sorry, now with image]</p><div></div>

<p>To give a size comparison with a slightly higher-end tripod,

here's my D4 on top of my shiny new TVC-34L. The plate of the

RRS tripod is somewhat bigger than the D4's, but not to the

extent that it makes it hard to access the controls. I've yet

to give this tripod a thorough attempt, but in the "press down

on the top and try to wiggle it" test it really does feel at

last as solid as the Gitzo GT5532LS I was considering - at least

with the bottom leg section retracted (it's my height with

three sections, so the fourth is for standing on hills) - and

it's much easier to carry. It's appreciably more solid than my

055CXPro3, but then it's three times the price...</p>

<p>[interrupted again. I wish it was possible to edit posts to change images...]</p><div></div>

<p>The base clamp lever overhangs the edge of the 34L's raised

plate, so there's room to move it - though since "horizontal" is

"loose" it wouldn't have a problem even on a bigger plate.</p><div></div>

<p>The biggest problem with the D4 was that of acquiring it.

It is sold in the UK, but rarely in stock and quite expensive;

the MonoballFix version and the D4m (with clamps but no gears)

seem slightly easier to acquire, possibly because they're less

desirable. I decided that my fastest route was to go straight

to the manufacturer (which was also how I got my TVC-34L).<br />

<br />

Arca-Swiss are a small company, apparently kept so by an

eccentricity of French law - they sell enough products that

they could probably grow easily were they not capped. This

has the unfortunate effect of inflating their prices and

putting their rarer items (like the D4 and Cube) on a waiting

list. There is a web presence (I'd heard rumours that there

wasn't) and the D4 can be found at

<a href="http://www.arca-swiss-magasin.com/contents/fr/d36_rotule-arca-swiss-d4.html">www.arca-swiss-magasin.com</a>.<br />

<br />

Being a small company, they don't take credit cards, meaning that

I had to trust a very expensive purchase to a bank transfer. My

communication was in school-grade French assisted by Google

Translate (by which I mean I got Google to translate what I wanted

to say and checked that I could read the result with my limited

French abilities), but my - very friendly and understanding -

contact and I got everything sorted out. Other than the delay

of a few weeks while waiting for a manufacturing run, it all

went smoothly. I had plenty of time to reconsider my purchase,

however. (But since they're still doing better than Burzynski,

I probably can't be too critical.)<br />

<br />

All in all, I'm pretty happy with the Triopo <i>with</i> the

Arca-Swiss clamp on top (without, it's a paperweight), at least

for the money, and I'm very happy with the D4 (and TVC-34L). I may

yet complement them with either a Burzynski or a Z1 if I feel

richer than I am, and I might pick up a Manfrotto 359 or a RRS

long lens support, but - in combination with 393 - I now feel that

my technique will be the reason for any residual wobbling or

inability to point the camera in the right direction.<br />

<br />

I hope this has been of some use to people; apologies to the

site maintainers for using Photo.net as a blog, but I figured this

information was more useful here than on a site of my own.</p>