Video Head for Vertical/Horizontal Shooting,+90°/-90°Tilt

I do some commercial videography as a solo production, so I have to maintain a pretty lightweight and portable kit condensed to 1 or 2 bags. I'm also paying for gear out of pocket so budget comes into the equation when purchasing new gear. I've played with a lot of budget portable video heads: Neweer, Ulanzi, Sirui, but this is the one, bang for buck, that I would recommend to anyone needing a travel friendly tripod video head. The drag is smooth on the fluid head, but there is some skipping at tighter adjustments horizontally, where more drag is needed, but no rough speed changes otherwise. Love the added lock in place vertical alignment and 90° pan turn options for sky shots. The design feels solidly built with great quality materials and metal parts. My favorite part though is the handle, oh man, I love the turn lock telescopic design, much better than the Neweer alternative, easily my favorite portable handle. I pair this video head with my Ulanzi F38 Fotopro Aircross tripod and my Sony ZVE10 with a Sigma 18-50mm, it's the perfect head for my twist-lock quick set-up combo kit. It is compatible with all of the Ulanzi F38 quick release plate mounts I own. Now, the cons, well, more like gripes. The biggest one and the thing I want the most on this head: a quick-adjust ball head. If your video head has a bubble level, but no means of fine tuning like a ball head, then it's really just telling you what you already know, isn't it? If it had a ball head, I wouldn't hesitate to say this would be the PERFECT portable video head. Maybe the next version will feature it, I hope so. The only other gripe is the horizontal pan doesn't have a great high resistance, slow drag, it pretty much only operates at the loosest setting, so it's up to your hand speed to get the slow pan, don't love that, but I can live with it. SmallRig, put a ball on this and it will be the absolute best travel head for the money!

I am a photojournalist who seldom shoots video. I use mirrorless cameras so a proper video fluid head is too big and bulky for the way I shoot, and too expensive to justify the higher cost for the limited use it would get. All my cameras have Arca Swiss L-brackets that are oriented 'east/west,' and my longer lenses have Arca-Swiss plates oriented 'north/south.' This head looked like the perfect solution; small and light, it supports the weight of my gear, and allows me to mount any camera or lens with a flick of a switch without adapters or switching to a different mount system. (I couldn't find any other product that did this!) everything seemed perfect, but the camera movements have no damping whatsoever. Panning and tilting was no smoother than what I could get from a traditional pan/tilt head. So despite its otherwise brilliant engineering, it doesn't do what a video head is designed to do: make camera movements smoother. Smallrig has a real winner here for photographers like me. I would happily pay a little more for the same head if they could address this one design issue. Sadly I will be returning this one, while watching for an updated version. Come on Smallrig, I know you can do it.

This is almost perfect, I use it for my Sony cameras and for the price it's super worth it. It's sturdy, easy to use, and is packed with extra features like the ability to use it vertically. I would give it a 5-star but when you turn it vertical it's not exactly 90 degrees, more like 95 or 100, so I have to offset it via the handle and bend it slightly in place... It is what it is... I still use it all the time.

likes: The tripod head doesn't disappoint. It seems to be well made. The Pan and Tilt controls hold my 10 lb camera rig well. It's small enough to fit into my cobra 3 monopod's carrying case. It's made mostly of aluminum. The handle retracts to a very pleasing size. Dislikes: The Arca Swiss tightening screw is a bit too close to the top of the head, especially if you already have a plate mounted on your rig. It becomes a little difficult to tighten with the battery mount attached. Also, I wish I could tighten the portrait to landscape hinge at different angles instead of it locking only in horizontal or 90 degrees. I still gave it five stars for now.

On paper this should be a near perfect solution for those needing a flexible design with Arca Swiss compatibility. Unfortunately, it is marred by design flaws and quality control issues. From a design perspective it is meant for tiny hands. Flip to vertical and the lever panning up and down ends up buried under the camera. Yes, you can switch the side on which the arm is mounted but it would then be inconveniently on the left for many users. They also would have also been better off allowing for the arm to be removed entirely since it but you are stuck with it The bigger problems though are quality control. I could live with a clumsy arm or a poorly placed lever in a quality head. Instead, you get bargain basement quality - actually even bargain heads will get basics right. To start the horizontal locking screw does nothing,. It is 1/8 inch too short so no amount of tightening will stop it from panning left or right. The screw to tighten the quick release plate also came loose twice during initial tests. Ponder the idea of flipping $4000+ worth of camera vertically and have it slide out. That would have happened if I had not noticed it was wobbling. No amount of tightening was enough and I do not have weak hands. Update: I received a second head on the assumption the first was imply defective. All of the same problems were immediately evident. The locking/damping screw worked for one set of panned stills. By the last of five shots, the camera could move freely along the horizontal axis, without even a hint of resistance. The locking screw for the quick release plate also loosened after an hour and when I flipped the camera to vertical, it started to slide out. Thankfully the tripod base was in the way to keep it from falling. I flipped back to horizontal, tightened it, and within another hour, it stated to wobble. No matter how much tightening was employed, it loosened on its own multiple times in a single evening. Altogether a complete disappointment that is being shipped back to Amazon. You may get lucky but that is not luck on would prefer to push. I would rather not have a Nikon Z8 on the ground or waste another evening in which barely touching a supposedly locked/damped head moved it left or right. Precision is not an option in a tripod head and "hope for the best" is not how I prefer to shoot. Yes, it is a clever design, but little thought has gone into implementation, and quality control is simply lacking.

I replaced a 3 way panning head with this because I wanted something that was easier to adjust with... and pan up and down or side to side. I was impressed with the size and weight of the head. The panning is super-smooth, but two additional features make this even better. There are two buttons on the head. One allows it to tilt 90° to easily go from Landscape to Portrait orientation. The second allows you to rotate the orientation of the base plate, so that if need front to back or side to side orientation, you can change it without any hassle. The telescoping handle is easy to adjust for operation in front of or behind the camera and makes it easy to collapse for folding and transportation. It is very well made and should last me many years.

This is an ok tripod head. The telescoping handle and horizontal to vertical functionality is nice. Ive noticed that the pan axis often "catches" unless the screw is loosened all the way. No way to tighten it to get a bit of resistance to smooth out shots. Can't say I'd recommend this one. It's OK and I kept it, but it's been turned into a tripod head for my phone instead of my camera. For that purpose it works fine, but I dont think the value is there.

Nearly perfect. This head is feature rich and overall it is well build. The only problem I have had is that after a few months of use, the hinge that hinges open for vertical shooting now hyper extends and sags so it is not perfectly level :(

Super nice. excellent quality. made really well. craftsmanship is great. purchased 2

Met my expectations. The top plate can be rotated, that's why I selected this product. In fact the only fluid head with rotating Swiss Arca bracket. That is very usefull when you attach camera body, directly to the head. The telescopic handle feel bit flimsy, but not a deal breaker

Good quality and compact!

Perfecto!!!

Der Fluidkopf erfüllt seine eigentliche Aufgabe sehr gut, hat pfiffige Details (Schwenkplatte), ist sehr gut verarbeitet und eignet sich sogar für einen Kugelkopf-Ersatz – Empfehlung!