Can You Use a Video Head for Wildlife Photography?
Stability plays a crucial role in getting sharp wildlife photos, and it greatly influence the quality and clarity of images you can capture in the field.
A steady hand or the use of a tripod can significantly reduce blurriness, allowing for sharper details of the subject. This becomes even more important when photographing animals in motion or when using longer lenses that require greater precision. Additionally, stability helps you maintain composition during unpredictable moments, enabling you to seize unique opportunities that arise. Overall, achieving stability is essential for creating compelling and impactful wildlife photographs.
However, can you actually use a video head and why not use a gimbal tripod head instead?
To answer the last question first. I have previously used a gimbal head with great succes. However I find that it is a bit clumsy and heavy, and when I also capture video, a gimbal head doesn’t give me the smooth motion of a pro level video head on top of the tripod.
On top of that, to avoid a gimbal taking up a significant part of your backpack, you with many models you can dissassemble it, but once you get to your location, you have to assemble it, which makes it slower to set up.
What is a video head, and why use it for wildlife photography?
Video heads are essential components in the world of videography providing the necessary stability and smooth movement required for capturing high-quality footage. These specialized tripod heads gives you precise control over camera angles and pans, allowing users to achieve a professional look in their work. The benefits of using a video head include improved stability, enhanced fluid movement, and reduced vibration, all of which contribute to producing visually appealing photos and video content. With a gimbal head you can only really capture photos.
Taken from a video using a video head and tripod for stabilization
Key features to consider
The load capacity of the video head is essential for ensuring stability and support during wildlife photography, as it needs to accommodate the weight of both the camera and the lens effectively.
Dampened panning and tilting movement is crucial for achieving smooth and controlled adjustments, which are particularly important when tracking fast-moving subjects in the wild. Look for a video head that allows you to adjust the dampened panning and tilting so you can modify the pan and tilt speed to suit whatever wildlife subject you want to capture.
The head height and weight are significant factors to evaluate, as they can influence the overall portability and ease of use of the setup in various outdoor environments.counter balance
You should also look for a video head with counter balance. This feature helps stabilize the camera setup, allowing for smoother movements when tracking animals in their natural habitat. A well-balanced video head reduces the strain, enabling you to shoot longer sessions without fatigue. Also the counter balance allows you to let go of the camera and it will stay in the same place until you decide to move it again, just like a gimbal.
Combine it With a Stable Tripod
Don’t make the mistake of choosing to light a tripod to combine with a pro level video head. This will work against you and result in blurred photos and shaky footage, if the tripod is not up for the combined weight of the video head and camera+lens combo.
Techniques for Using Video Heads in the Field
Make sure that the tripod base is level as this will affect the video heads ability to stay level as you pan around.
For faster moving subjects and birds, I suggest that you loosen the pan and tilt function as much as possble, to enable you to quickly frame the subject and start shooting. However for slower moving subject or subjects that only moving within a limited space you can tighten the tension a bit to restrict the movement and make it a more smooth experience of tracking the subject.
Alternative setup
If you want to shoot with the video head in a a close to the ground set up, move the video head to ground-pod. This will also give you a lighter overall set up, if you know that this will be the best way to spend the entire session.
Concluding words
I enjoy the ability to work handheld when stalking animal to get closer. However for longer sessions at the same location a good tripod with a pro video head is my preferred set up, which I have been using for years. This also means that my big and bulky gimbal head is now collecting a great deal of dust on the shelf.
