Tuesday, January 19, 2021

Question... Tripod Center Columns—Do They Really Negatively Impact Stability?


Forever and ever, I've seen, read and heard professional photographers say over and over again that a tripod with a center column is not as stable, good, worthwhile, etc., as one without a center column.  They almost always advise against buying one.  But none ever cite any bonafide scientifically controlled and conducted studies with empirical results.  They just pronounce this as true.  Well, I’m not one just to accept something as fact just because someone says so.
I can conceive that using a tripod and having the center column fully extended does impact stability, but what about using a tripod that merely has a center column which is not extended or just slightly extended and is locked down tightly?  Also, I understand that a tripod with a center column usually cannot be set as close to the ground as one without a center column.  That isn't my issue.

I've never owned a full sized tripod without a center column and in my experience, anecdotal as it has been, I've never experienced a problem as far as I have been able to tell.  That said, I rarely extend my center column more than a couple of inches to 'fine tune' a composition and I find that ability to fine tune a composition by slightly extending a center column very valuable.
My question:  Does anyone know of any scientifically conducted studies that empirically quantify any differences in stability between a tripod that has no center column and one that does, all other things about the tripods being equal?

If so, please comment and point me to the study or studies.  I'm sure others besides myself would like to read it/them.

Thank you.

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Dennis A. Mook  

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6 comments:

  1. BobJanuary 19, 2021 at 9:55 AM

    Dennis,

    Here's a site that may answer some of your questions.
    https://thecentercolumn.com/

    Bob

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousJanuary 19, 2021 at 3:18 PM

    Hi Dennis, there is one site that seems to perform quantitative tests on tripods, but without delving into the individual reviews, I'm not sure if they test center columns (despite their name). https://thecentercolumn.com/testing-tripod-stiffness-and-damping-at-the-center-column/

    Walter

    ReplyDelete
  3. Matti MäkijärviJanuary 20, 2021 at 4:57 AM

    Hi Dennis,
    found some (well, not so scientifically conducted...):

    http://regex.info/blog/2007-09-17/575

    https://thecentercolumn.com/

    Also, I owned many years ago a Linhof tripod for view cameras, and it had extra support beams going from the legs to the bottom of the center column's bottom.

    Regards,

    /matti

    ReplyDelete