So far in this year’s DIYP gift guides, we’ve covered cameras, lenses, lights and bags. But whether you shoot stills or video, at some point you’ll likely need something to mount your camera to. So here are some of the new ones that have come out over the last year or so and the ones that we use the most.
As video tripods go, this is one of my favourites of 2019. It’s based on Manfrotto’s popular 190x legs, but with a centre column that features a levelling base. This means that the head you put on top of it (and your camera) stays level when you pan or tilt. It comes with the Manfrotto 500 fluid head, which offers pretty smooth pans and tilts for a lower budget head and I found it to be fantastic for shooting landscapes, video and timelapse while I was exploring Arizona earlier this year.
Manfrotto 635 Fast Single Leg Carbon – $749 (B&H)
Speaking of serious tripods, the Sachtler Flowtech 75 legs and Ace XL Fluid Head are going to be overkill for a lot of people out there. But as camera rigs get bigger and heavier, with monitors, lights, HDMI transmitters, microphone receivers, V-Mount batteries and all kinds of things attached to them, you need a solid tripod that can hold them. When you buy a tripod like this, you’re buying a tripod for life, that will serve you very well with pretty much anything you choose to mount on it.
Let’s kick off the gimbals with Zhiyun’s recently released Crane M2. It’s a very small gimbal designed for use with compact and very small mirrorless cameras, although it can also work with smartphones and action cameras, too. It’s a super small gimbal for what it can carry that easily slips into your bag and makes you more inclined to actually use it. I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve taken a gimbal with me somewhere, but then not used it because it’s too big and unwieldy. The Crane M2 is a breeze to set up and use, though.
We might as well start on the sliders with the weirdest looking one to be released this year. That’s the Moza Slypod. It’s a “2-in-1” slider and monopod, but it looks like no slider we’ve ever seen before. Instead of a carriage and a standard dual-rail arrangement, this has one tube inside another that moves in and out to move your camera. It’s a slider you just have to really try in order to understand the benefits, but it allows you to get some unique shots that would be difficult or impossible with other types of slider, especially when used in conjunction with a gimbal, like the AirCross 2 mentioned above.
Syrp Genie II 3-Axis Kit – $2,827 (B&H)
Overview
There are so many options for supporting and stabilising your camera these days that it’s almost impossible to settle on just one for all of our needs. Sometimes we need rock-solid stability above all else. Sometimes we need portability. Sometimes we need to move the camera while we’re shooting. And sometimes it needs to move itself and just be left alone to do its thing. What’s your favourite tripod, gimbal or slider? If you haven’t checked them out already, don’t forget to look at our gift guides for cameras, lenses, lighting and bags. Tomorrow, we’ll finish off our gift guide series with those invaluable accessories that make our lives easier and can sometimes be impossible to live without!
