Comments (1)

By Brian, October 15, 2008 12:34 pm

One of the main complains I have when hiking light, is that you have to compromise what you bring with you. I have tried to hike with less than 3 cameras but at the end always convinced myself to bring a point and shoot, a rangefinder and a SLR at a minimum. The point shoot for everyday tourist shots, rangefinder to shoot people, and SLR for the more artistic shots where I need a TTL-accurate compositioning and filtration system.

So I found myself oogling at a compact Gitzo GT1541T 4 sectioned tripod while on business trip in Taipei, and before I knew it, I had that tripod in the hotel room. It weights just shy of 1kg (0.98 to be exact) and extends to a height where you just have to crouch down, or get down to your knees to shoot. For a 6 footer at least. Not too bad considering I wouldn’t be able to cover the hiking distance I usually cover in a day if I had to bring my old Gitzo 1228 tripod with Kirk Photo’s BH-3 ball head.

What is so special about the 1541? There are many sites on the web with the technical feature description, but for me, the foot folds over the top of the head to create a compact system, enough to fit into my 25 litre backpack and sturdy enough to put on a DSLR with a wide angle lens. I know I don’t carry anything more than a 105mm prime lens when I hike, so there’s no need to consider the weight of a 200mm or 300mm lens weight on that thing.

Continue reading 'Gitzo 1541T Tripod with RRS BH25 Ballhead system'»

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By Brian, September 1, 2008 11:23 am

After 4 years of deliberating, finally got my first DX wide angle lens on Saturday in Tokyo. It’s rated a little below mint because of overused mount, and somehow I didn’t see any rubber seal on it, so I guess it was replaced by the service centre.

So justification: I have been holding back on this lens but finally thought its time for my first AFS and DX lens (previous lenses are mostly AIS and AFD at most) because it seems to work at 18mm and above on my full frame film SLRs as well. The initial test yesterday confirms that at 24mm the lens is sharp. Can’t say too much about contrast as the weather was quite hazy here, but its nice to be able to go wide on my D2H now.