Old Tripod, New Tricks

Today I tried explaining to a friend via Google Talk how I just learned that I've been missing out on something really obvious about my Manfrotto tripod that I've owned for the better part of a decade. While watching a YouTube video on studio macro, the host talked about why he liked his tripod, and this was one of the reasons.

It's possible to get the camera really close to a shooting surface by reversing the center pillar, head and camera so that it hangs from the tripod instead of being supported by it. I'm sure some of you are chuckling at me right now and that's ok. I deserve it.

The only camera I own other than the D300s is the one in my Blackberry 8900, and I used it to take the shot below. It's an older Blackberry, and the camera is absolutely terrible. If you're not taking a wide shot in absolutely perfect light (and by perfect, I mean bright), the image quality is... ass. There's no other way to describe it.

This is the absolutely terrible photo of my tripod, showing the head reversed with the lens about one inch higher than the shooting surface. Badly close-cropped to spare you the view of my early-stages home macro studio. Taken with the Blackberry's flash, not that you'd notice.

This is the best photo I've taken with my Blackberry 8900. The moral of the story is, if you want a phone that can capture a decent image, buy an iPhone.

I'm really looking forward to putting my new-found tripod knowledge to work. I can think of at least one time in the field when I was shooting flowers low to the ground that would have been easier had I used the tripod like this. While mounting the camera like this constrains its movement, it'll be handy in the studio when I can set up the shot no other way.

© Jeremy Buehler and Bug Noir (www.bugnoir.com), 2010.