Just realised how bad my tripod is

cowboyBuilder

I have a velbon cx 660 and this has been ok for landscape shots or some nighttime street shots that I have occasionally used it for.
But last night I was taking some shots of the Moon + Jupiter - Got some good shots of the moon, but when trying longer exposures of Jupiter
I couldn't believe the shake.
I had the mirror locked up and a 10 second delay with the trigger and not a breeze in the air - but still I got a lot of shake in the final image.

I'm amazed there was such motion, is there such a thing as a rock solid tripod ? or will there always be some sort of movement ?

magicbastarder

if you're taking photos of jupiter, it could be atmospheric disturbance too - though i'm not exactly certain i could tell the difference between motion blur from the tripod and blur from the atmosphere.

cowboyBuilder

Nope this is a squiggle ...

Also I took some long exposure (4s) shots of the Moon with a 3.0 ND filter and its not as clear as 1/250 no filter shots ...

flyingsnail

In general a heavy tripod will be more stable / less liable to any form of shake. I have an old manfrotto 055Pro that is good for long exposures, I have done up to 300 seconds and they are still pretty sharp, but it is a bit expensive and heavy to haul around.

Using a cable release / remote and mirror lockup are good. The less extended the tripod legs are the more stable it will tend to be and try to avoid extending the central column if possible. Attaching extra weight to the tripod such and a camera bag or sand bag can help. If possible position your body to act like a windbreak during the exposure.

Scolopax

Just a thought, did you turn off image stabilisation ? (If you have it, of course).

ED E

It looks like a €30 tripod TBH, discontinued everywhere so hard to get an accurate idea of it.

Very similar to my Hama 61, cheap and cheerful but useless for long range shots.

Judge

Don't forget Moon, Earth and Jupiter are all moving. If you're using a long focal length and a long exposure this motion can get picked up unless you're using a tracking mount. The general rule is exposure can't be greater than 500/focal length without picking up motion blur. See here.

cowboyBuilder

Scolopax wrote: »

Just a thought, did you turn off image stabilisation ? (If you have it, of course).

cowboyBuilder

Judge wrote: »

Don't forget Moon, Earth and Jupiter are all moving. If you're using a long focal length and a long exposure this motion can get picked up unless you're using a tracking mount. The general rule is exposure can't be greater than 500/focal length without picking up motion blur. See here.

OK so this was at 400mm, and 4s exposure.

So thats too long , Ill try some more experiments later (around the 1s mark) (turning IS off too )
But for sure its a crap tripod I need to get another.

The Ging and I

Tripods are the most overlooked piece of kit in photography imo. If you want to get the most out of your kit- use a good tripod.
A good one with a good head and levelling base will set you back but it is a one off investment.

cowboyBuilder

The Ging and I wrote: »

Tripods are the most overlooked piece of kit in photography imo. If you want to get the most out of your kit- use a good tripod.
A good one with a good head and levelling base will set you back but it is a one off investment.

Any recommendations off hand ?

The Ging and I

Theres a lot to consider. What weight/size cameras , your height, outdoors/studio, budget.
Personally when Im using big telephoto lenses outdoors and prefer a maximum height of 1.8m prefer carbon as its lot more stable than most.
Gitzo and Really Right Stuff are imo as good as it gets.
Ball /gimbal heads heads , Arca and Wimberly.
Leveling bases I prefer to adjustable columns as I do a lot of panning and again Gitzo and RRS
Gitzo is more available in Ireland. RRS is US based but a German company stocks most of it augenblicke-eingefangen.com.
Look on all the usual pre loved sites for all of above.