Spent 45 minutes leveling my tripod before realizing the ground was just uneven

2 comments

2 Comments

Borrowed my friend's tripod for a sunrise shoot and he set it up on a sloped lawn. Watched the whole thing slowly tip over into a puddle right as the sky got good. He never leveled the legs and the ground was all bumpy. Now I always check both before I leave the house.

seanjohnson16d ago

Wait @kim_patel89, did you ever check if the center column was fully down too? That's another thing people miss, and it makes the whole setup top heavy. The legs being unleveled is bad enough, but adding that extra height on a slope is just asking for trouble. Ive seen guys do the opposite too, they extend the center column way up thinking it makes them taller, but it actually makes the whole rig wobble more. So many tripod fails happen because of the column, not just the legs.