Where's a good place to get tripods online?

[cherubfish pair]

Where's a good place to get tripods online?

[Phyl]

The first thing you need to do is figure out what kind of tripod you really want. What camera are you putting on it? What features do you need in it? Where are you going to be taking the tripod?

You can get tripods ranging from a 30$ cheapie to a 500$ pair of legs that you'd still need to purchase a head for at most of the online gear shops (www.bhphotovideo, www.ritzcamera.com, ...).

[beerguy]

There are 3 desirable attributes that determine the quality of a tripod

Lightweight
Stable
inexpensive

In practice you can only pick two at at time. For example, if you want a very lightweight and very stable tripod it will not be inexpensive. You can get inexpensive and stable but it's going to weigh a ton. That might be okay depending on whether or not you plan on traveling with it and how you shoot.

I do primarily landscape work so nearly every shot that I take is from a tripod. My setup cost me ~$1200. While that's probably overkill for your needs its important to understand that this is one of those situations where it's cheaper to buy "the right one" first rather than buying several cheaper ones that don't do the job and then have to buy the right one.

Things to look for.

You want one that you an look through, standing up, without extending the center column. An inch or two isn't a big deal but if you've got to fully extend the column it's not going to be stable.

The fewer the number of joints in the legs, the better. That does extend the collapsed length so you have to decide which is more important.

A ball head is easier to use than a "pan and tilt" head.

Cheers

[swjim]

I buy all of my photo gear from B&H, their prices are competetive and they are very reputable.

There are a lot of shady camera vendors on the net, if you see a price that looks too good to be true, it most likely is. If you go with a lesser known vendor be sure to check www.resellerratings.com first.

Good luck.