This test was precipitated by a discussion of the relative merits of a Gitzo 1325 (unavailable for this test) and the 1228.

The 1228 is rigged with a Markins TB20 base plate (no center column), with a Markins M10 ballhead. Camera is Nikon D2H with 70-200VR with RRS custom lens foot + Nikkor TC-17E II working at 340mm F/4.8. Zoomed all the way to 200mm for an effective 340mm FL.

The 1410 has the Systematic flat plate and the same M10 ballhead. No center hook and therefore no extra weight.

The 1228 was fully extended (even the "pencil thin" 4th leg) which put the viewfinder at eye level for me, 5'6" tall. Worst case for those legs.

The 1410 had about 6" of the lower leg extended and most of the middle leg, which put it at the same (comfortable) eye level for me. This is a 3 section so there are only two adjustable legs.

Target is a test chart many of us have seen and it happened to still be mounted on a piece of foam core board. Shot shortly before sundown in the shade, allowing an easy 1/30s exposure at F/8 without adding anything to the system like ND filters.

(I would not use this image as a critical absolute sharpness test. LaserJet printed charts can be very misleading, especially if the exposure is not perfect.)

On both tripods, I shot 3 images each, using the following 7 methods:

1. Machine Gun: Set to single frame, one hand on the camera firing the shutter.

2. Long Lens Technique (LLT): Left hand on the top of the lens. Eye to the viewfinder but I recently lost my rubber eyecup and have had trouble sourcing a replacement so it was imperfect technique.

3. Self Timer set to 10s. Shutter fired by hand (no remote) then hands off for the shutter release. The camera had 10s to settle down.

4. Mirror Lockup (MLU) + LLT. Fired by hand (no remote), I gave it a few seconds to settle before the second shutter press.

The following afternoon I added these three:

5. Single frame advance with MC-20 remote. Hands off. Similar to #1 but with remote.

6. Self timer (10s) with MC-20 remote. hands off. The D2H does nto offer self timer and MLU so, yes, this is effectively the same as the preceding but I did it for completeness.

7. MLU with MC-20 remote. Hands off.

Raw compressed NEF files were adjusted for white balance, in camera "Normal" sharpening left as is. I would normally apply USM but for tests lesser may be better. The images were rendered and saved as highest quality JPG in Nikon Capture 4.4.2. The best images of each group were stitched together in Photoshop CS and saved as a highest possible quality jpg.

I exercised reasonable but limited care in taking these images. first, I was in a hurry as the sun was setting and I didn't want exposure variances. Second, I was trying to keep skill out of this test to some extent. I used the care that I assume most of us use in real life day to day shooting where things happen fast and we don't have 10 minutes to think about an image.

Analysis:

The 1228 images had much variability. I selected the best of each set of 3 for the composite image. The Machine gun and LLT shots had the most variability, which is what I get in real life shooting. I'm not the best LLT mechanic but I'm working on it and getting better. The only consistent images were the MLU images. Here it looked like I knew what I was doing.

The 1410 images were more consistent, but still with some variability as above.

The most consistent images on both tripods were the MLU images. If you spend a couple evenings searching photo forums for opinions on the 1228, and then study my image here, you will understand why some people love that tripod and some hate it. You will never get a consensus of opinion, but nor do you usually get the precise details of the shooter's technique or his skill level (we all think we are Photo Gods, right?).

Obviously, at 1/30s, the problem is related to mirror slap, at least on this camera/lens setup. Note that with care, images from the 1228 can almost equal the 1410, but with sloppy shooting the results are disastrous.

Note also the last 3 techniques I used with the MC-20 electronic remote. The MLU images are almost identical (good news), but note that even the 1410 image is not as sharp as I think it should be. Fodder for future testing.

These images do not in any way reflect the results you might get at higher shutter speeds, say 1/FL, in this case about 1/300s. A 1/30s shutter speed is universally considered to be a difficult speed.

Hope you learned something here; I know I did!