Friday, January 27, 2012

Thoughts on Flip or Twist Lock Tripods

On almost every forum I belong to I praise the almighty tripod...the true image stabilizer.
Tripods were stabilizing cameras and lenses long before the 1st stabilizer was a gleam in the inventors eye....but that is not the reason for to nites post... this post is about flip locks or twist locks..both work and work extremely well.

So why should you choose one locking mechanism over the other?  That is truly a personal choice.  I started out with the quick lock, flip lock, and after years of blood blisters in the web between the thumb and 1st finger I went to the twist lock and never looked back...also i found my wildlife kill average went way up....those flip locks are noisy and I worked to get mine to close quietly...but deer and other wildlife have fantastic hearing.  So now I can be setting up my tripod and have wildlife looking at me and not get spooked by that ever not so subtle snap of the flip lock...yes it takes a few extra micro seconds to adjust and lock down the legs to hold that 50-500mm lens + body but my ratio of shots gotten now as opposed to before is way up...so for me it is very much worth saving myself from the pain I was inflicting on myself.

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