MDeVe Tripod Review

Got my new toy in the mail last week, a Manfrotto MDeVe tripod, featuring 2 stage legs, a 50mm integrated ball head, and 5ft oh height playroom (mine has no center column, but w/e floats your boat). I got it in a pack form BH with a 501 HDV head.

The sticks: fair. They're strong, good enough for a handheld camera. The ball head is nice. You can stretch the legs out to 3 posistions, so you can get really low.

The head: ok. It's sturdy, it's fluid. Nothing special. It's not as good as a 516 or 510, but it's reasonable. At first the pan and tilt appears to be a little sticky, but give it a working, and it breaks in a little better. The counter balance though isn't very strong. At this point, it can barely balance itself, but maybe with some time to break it in, hopefully that can improve too.

Overall, good buy for a sturdy, sure fire, handheld camera tripod.