Thursday, December 8, 2016

Manfrotto 501 Video Head

Today I experienced another example of one of the advantages of having lots of everything (gear everywhere!). In one of my previous incarnations and buying sprees in search of becoming a filmmaker I bought a nice large 501 Manfrotto video head along with 2 sets of tripod legs. Today I took the that head off the legs and put them on my Gitzo carbon fibre tripod then mounted my video camera rig to it. Everything works very nicely. I do not think the head is too much to big, maybe a bit but it is better to have a head that can handle more weight than it has to versus one that is over matched.

Earlier today I was scoping out some Benro video heads (from China) on Ebay and the size I needed ran $249 USD. Now I do not have to buy that unit and instead can use the Manfrotto head I bought several years ago. Finally a bit of saving and no need to buy more new gear. I believe I will take this larger Manfrotto video head with me to the dump. I will not take and use it everyday but the days I do use it will allow me slow non jumpy professional looking video pans.