Tripod and head question

Hi all....again!!

Questions questions!!

My friend is having a dilema over the following:

He is happy buying the Gitzo 5540? (the 1548 equivalent) which doesn't surprise me but is wondering what the best system is for combining bird photography (500/4is and 1d2) with landscape photography (10-20mm and 1d2) with minimal kit.

He is looking at:
Full gimbal head or even a sidekick with Arca Swiss b1 head, but how would he change, reasonably quickly, to a wide lens without taking the sidekick off, for instance?

Are there any quick release plates or similar to achieve this? He'd want to shoot in portrait and landcape mode but the wide lens obviously won't have a tripod ring and the camera will need mounting on the head somehow.

Any ideas? He's is desperate to buy this after lunch today - lucky git!!

cheers

Graeme

Graeme, suggest a Kirk 'L plate'. I have a kirk plate permanantly attached to my D200 for macro and wide angle work. the kirk plates are Arca style and should be compatible with the Arca Swiss head. (purchased through Warehouse express). the L plate allows the camera to be changed from portrait to landscape very quickly.

hope this helps

John

Try looking at either Kirk or Really Right, they both do "L" brackets to fit onto the camera body which have integral Arca mounting. They are intended for landscape etc. shooting. Also take a look at Naturescapes.net they do a Gimbal Head Adapter, http://www.naturescapes.net/store/product.php?productid=180

Personally it looks like the Naturescapes.net Gimbal Head Adapter might be the best option, assuming you have a Arca foot fitted to the base of the camera. Just shoot with the gimbal locking knob away from you.

Still it is a starting point for you.

Thanks guys. I think he's weighing up the options now.

Doesn't need to be expensive - He can use a sidekick for the longer lenses with a tripod foot, and use a small arca-swiss style camera plate attached to the camera's tripod bush when he wants to use a wide angle lens - removing the sidekick isn't any problem and is only a matter of seconds! The camera plate simply slots into the arca-swiss ball-head dovetail. To switch horizontal to vertical with wide-angle, he just needs to unlock the ball and move it into the slot in the ball-head. If he has (or is going to buy) an arca-swiss ballhead, then go for the arca swiss plates - some of the other makes don't fit the dovetail correctly as I found when I borrowed one of Tom's camera plates at the UKNP conference earlier this year - think it was a kirk or RRS plate he had - certainly wasn't an Arca Swiss one as it wouldn't tighten up into the dovetail fully!

Thanks Nick. I've given him the link to here.

Ditto Nicks thoughts above as regards the sidekick. I use one on a Kirk BH1 ballhead (on G1548 legs) for my 500mm & have a regular plate on my D2x for wide angle shooting using the ballhead alone. Very quick to swap & very versitile.