An Ideal Fluid Head
As an independent filmmaker with limited funds (and not a full time DP able to hire just the right equipment for every occasion), choosing gear that will cope with a wide variety of projects is key. Once again, I find myself carefully researching the purchase of essential video gear - this time a decent fluid head. I’m writing this in case my findings may be of use to those in a similar position.
One huge advantage of using a lightweight digital cinema camera is that the rest of the gear can be lightweight, as well. Finding a good lightweight and strong carbon fiber tripod is no problem, but choosing the best fluid head for the job is much more difficult! For me, design, build quality, weight and ergonomics are very important, as well as the price; I like to enjoy using my gear.
Sachtler, Miller, Vinten and Cartoni, amongst others, all make fluid heads for cameras in the 2 to 10+ pound range (and beyond). As well as smooth panning and tilting, a fluid head has to allow the camera to be set at any angle of tilt and stay in that position without drifting up or down. To achieve this, most fluid heads provide a stepped balance spring control, offering a range of discrete settings. This is to accommodate a variety of camera rigs with different weights. However, if the weight of the rig falls between two presets, the camera will want to drift away from its position setting, and the operator will need to stop this by applying gentle pressure to the pan bar. Although this is not a huge problem, it adds extra complexity to operating the camera.
Top of the range fluid heads from manufacturers like O’Conner use a continuous 'sinusoidal' balance mechanism with no steps. These are designed for use with equally top of the range cinema rigs, which are traditionally very modular. The camera body and lens can be festooned with extra monitors, batteries, matte boxes and lens controls. So the weight of a rig can change by several ounces or pounds from location to location. Proper balance of this type of rig is more accurately achieved with continuous balance mechanisms, by simply turning a stepless knob until the camera is balanced. These 'top tier' heads are designed for heavy-weight equipment and are in the stratospheric price rang
Today’s lightweight digital cinema camera systems have also become very modular, so their weight can also vary depending on configuration, accessories and lenses being used. Because of this, accurate balance with fixed weight steps can be difficult to achieve. Enter the FH-350, a fluid head from Really Right Stuff (RRS). Their fluid head has a continuous ‘sinusoidal' balance system that offers the same high level of tuned control delivered by those top tier heads, but for cameras between 1.6 and 10 pounds. For some time, I had been oscillating back and forth between a Vinten, Miller or Sachtler head, before coming across the RRS fluid head. With the start of a series of projects, a decision had to be made. At $1,850, the RRS is at the top end of the price range for fluid heads in this class. But as well as the highly desirable sinusoidal balance control, it appeared to offer much better build quality and ergonomics.
The FH-350 uses RRS and Arca-style quick release camera plates, so one has to buy into that mounting system, as well. The head comes in two variations: with a built in 75mm leveling bowl and with a quick release base, requiring a separate quick release 75mm leveling bowl (also available in 100mm size). There is also a version of the quick release leveling head that fits standard tripods without a leveling bowl (http://www.reallyrightstuff.com/TA-U-LC-Universal-Leveling-Base-with-Clamp). I use a Gitzo carbon fiber tripod with a 75mm leveling bowl, so I would need the head and the quick release leveling base (which adds a further $290). The trouble was there are very few (all positive) real user reviews to be found, and the only way to try it out is to buy it directly from Really Right Stuff and rely on RRS’s return policy if it was not as good as expected.
These heads are made to order, so it takes a little longer to get than off the shelf products. It arrived beautifully packaged, and straight out of the box, it was obvious that this is a very high quality product, all parts beautifully designed, machined and smooth to the touch. There are no plastic parts to be seen at all; even the control knobs are all machined metal. It’s definitely built to last. All the legends are well designed and laser engraved. The anodized coatings are exemplary. The leveling bowl fits the Gitzo like a glove, and the quick release mechanism for attaching the head to the bowl is a sheer delight. The lever has three positions: the first opens the rail clamp wide enough to drop the head’s dovetail into place, the second position closes enough to capture the dovetail, but allows it to slide back and forth, and the third position locks the dovetail solidly in place. I can't emphasize the quality of design and construction of this head enough. It is a precision-engineered instrument and makes even the well made Sachtler FSB-6 look and feel shabby to me by comparison. At this point, I’m sounding a bit like the guy in an old car add who keeps going into the garage all night to look at his shiny new car. For me, this fluid head is a thing of beauty. Enough of the aesthetics, so how well does it do its job?
The quick release leveling base adds a bit of height to the head (over one with an integrated leveling bowl), but being able to quickly detach it from the tripod without disassembling the base is a big advantage for me. The leveling base can be left in the tripod, and the fluid head quickly detached for separate packing. The It's not just a case of choosing the best preset, the one with the least tilt forward, back and spring resistance to movement.head is small enough to fit into my camera backpack rather than packing in a suitcase with the tripod. If baggage gets lost, it’s far easier to buy a new tripod than it is to get a new fluid head in a hurry. The head does have a 3/8 inch threaded hole in the dovetail, so it can be mounted to a variety of platforms without the leveling base, if needed.
The pan bar attaches to the left or right of the head by a kind of locking clutch mechanism rather than the more common Arri Rosette (giving a much finer control over positioning the bar). The quick release plate is similar to that on the leveling base. It accepts RSS or Arca dovetail plates attached to the bottom of the camera. With the locking clamp lever fully open, the camera plate can be dropped into position (no need for fiddle sliding the plate into the clamp). The second position allows the camera to easily slide back and forth to achieve primary balance. Having both the tilt damping turned off and spring balance adjustment set to zero, the camera is moved back and forth until it neither drops forward nor back in the normal way. (Using a calibrated camera plate enables the balance position of the camera to be recorded for future use.) At that point, the camera clamp lever is closed, and the spring balance control adjusted, until the camera can be tilted forward or back and stay in position without falling further forward or back. This is where the continuous sinusoidal balance mechanism really shines. The balance mechanism is continuously adjusted, until the camera stays absolutely still, in any position, and with no spring resistance to movement at all.
The rest of the functions are the same as with other heads; it’s just that all the controls and functions are better engineered and smoother operating than any of them that I have used. The pan and tilt has four levels of damping, and the head will unusually tilt through 180 degrees, straight up to straight down. This is an important difference; the Vinten Vision Blue has continuous spring balance, as well, and is half the price. The problem is that adjusting the continuous spring balance on the Vinten restricts the tilt angle, unlike the FS-350.
For several projects, I need to shoot vertical video. My camera easily fits onto a custom bracket that allows the camera to be rotated through 90 degrees. The bracket itself has an Arca-style quick release wedge, but at right angles to the ‘for and aft’ fluid head quick release slide. There are plenty of dovetail slides with 'left and right' clamps, which make this unusual rig easy to balance perfectly. The wide range of both RRS and Arca adapters and plates enables virtually any combination of DSLR or modular video camera to be easily and quickly mounted and balanced (within the weight range of course). I discovered there are two 1/4 threaded sockets on the left hand side of the head. These are conveniently positioned to accept articulate arms or other 1/4 in thread based mounting devices for monitors and the like, taking some load off the camera.
The head weighs in at 4.3 pounds, so is marginally lighter than other heads in its class, but the quick release leveling head adds 12 ounces to the weight of the tripod. However, the whole package is very manageable for ‘a one man band' on the road. Apart from doing its job exceptionally well, it is a joy to use. As you probably have guessed by now, I am very pleased and will not be returning it.
See more details at http://www.reallyrightstuff.com/FH-350-Fluid-Head-with-Dovetail-or-Ball-Base