I’ve been looking for a good light-weight small travel tripod for a long time. I didn’t mind spending a little extra for compactness. I was thinking maybe something carbon fibre. Hmmm.

I was in no rush, until a video project in Ukraine presented itself, I needed something quick. I couldn’t find the perfect tripod so (as there was to be no panning in this particular project) I bought something very small and compact, but wasn’t sure if it was sturdy enough to carry the weight of a 5DmkII with a 70-200mm L lens attached.

This is what I bought from Maplin’s UK: (this seems to be vey similar to this tripod available in the US)

This small unsuspecting tripod opens to 1 metre in length. But is extremely compact when closed (29cm). The legs are telescopic and lock into position by simply turning each topmost section until it clicks. I used this for my project in Ukraine, but it had one very big flaw.

The ball head was never build to handle fairly heavy equipment. I had to screw the ball had as tight as possible, but the camera would still sometimes start to droop down.

I started researching small ball heads I could replace with. I decided to get a Manfrotto head, so I could use the standard plate that is attached to all my other equipment.

This is what I found on Amazon UK (also available on Amazon USA): Manfrotto 494RC2 Small Ball Head with Quick Release

I combined the two together (simple standard screw) and this is the final result:

Obviously this isn’t the sturdiest tripod out there(!) But for some situations, I prefer to sacrifice sturdiness for compactness. It’s small enough to put inside my camera bag and I find myself using a tripod much more often. I’m very happy with it.