Garden Gnome Software

Hi all !
I'm looking for a new and compact travel tripod to shoot 360 panos - including that pesky floor nadir.
It needs to be small, compact, not expensive and ideally able to shoot the floor area for nadir. Max height not of maximum importance as I accept there will be compromises.
Any suggestions ?
Thanks y'all !

I travel by air a lot for client shoots, and I am very particular about my tripods.

After trying out various models, I have settled on the following-

Induro Tripods CLT104 No. 1 Stealth Carbon Fiber Tripod, 4 Sections
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00Z17U65G/re ... XAb5E081K1

Sells for about $350

Have been using this tripod heavily for everything and everywhere for about a year now. Tripods I have used in the past have been various Gitzo, Manfrotto, Feisol, Giottos and a few others I don't remember.

Some of the requirements I had for my tripod were-

- Carbon fiber
- Fit in carry on plane luggage when folded
- Twist locks on legs (with larger knurling/grip than Gitzo, so as to be easier on the hands)
- Tall enough maximum height
- durable leg-locking (unlike Feisol for example, which have garbage leg locks)
- Non-twist legs, non-twist center column
- Padded upper legs (I often carry the tripod over my shoulder)
- Included tripod bag
- Does *not* have removable leg that can be used as monopod (these cause problems)
- Adjustable center column
- good warranty
- Center hook if needed
- locking screw on mounting plate

Only thing this tripod did not have that would have been nice, but not required, would have been a built-in leveling column.

Thanks, really appreciate your recommendation ! I have an Induro carbon fibre video tripod and they are very well made. Did not know about this model.

I wonder ... how do you shoot your down nadir floor shot without an adjustable horizontal extension arm ?

I have this Nodal Ninja nadir adapter - but never really got on that well with it.
I also saw this cheap carbon fibre tripod on Amazon ... might be ok for short trips.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00 ... ROKL5A1OLE

I generally don't bother with nadir adapters. If it's a single exposure of short enough duration I just lift up the whole rig and manually point the camera down and shoot. If I am bracketing, long exposure, or both- then I move the tripod back a bit, angle the camera down, shoot and then stitch in PTGui using "Viewpoint correction". Thinking ahead about camera placement and where your nadir is going to be while shooting also helps.

The only times I have used a nadir adapter were rare instances where I was shooting down onto a reflective surface (Eg: Chrome diamond plate), or some type of grating or area of uneven texture (containing objects, or on stairs etc) where 'viewpoint correction' could look odd.

To bring this back around to relating to Pano2VR- It's ability to extract patches for nadirs is a nice way to get your nadir area into Photoshop in order to patch using Photoshop's "Auto Blend Layers" (after doing an alignment). Be sure to save a duplicate source patch section/layer to fade in the area (large circle with 200px feather for example) around the finished patch as "Auto Blend Layers" tends to modify tone and color to varying degree in the overall image.

Thanks for the tips an advice Mbb ... That PTGui viewpoint correction is a Godsend. I used to have to blend all manually ...

Haven't played with Photoshops new 360 features yet either ... another thing to do when i have five minutes.

Still tempted by that Amazon travel tripod bargain ... at UK £60 ... it's a bit of a bargain.