5 Tripod Mistakes Every Photographer Commits

Last Updated :

You’ve got that amazingly expensive DSLR and now want to buy all the cool accessories, like tripods, which will help you photograph better. All camera manuals will go on and on about how certain situations require you to shoot only with a tripod if you ever want to capture any good pictures, which is the reason you have started hunting for one?

Then here’s some friendly advice, while learning how to use a camera tripod properly, also learn what not to do while using it. Mistakes committed by other photographers can teach you a lot, so rather than making those errors yourself, pay attention! Committing such blunders and learning it after that – maybe at the expense of a broken camera or tripod – can be quite painful.

It goes without saying that you must not go for a cheap tripod. Invest in a good quality and branded tripod, since your expensive camera is going to sit on it’s head.

1. A collapsible tripod will have extendable legs. Which means that lower end of a tripod leg can slide in and out of it’s outer cover. When not needed, it can be safely tucked inside the cover, which work as legs too. But when you take the lower end out to extend the height of tripod, you will notice that the tripod is not as stable as before. So here’s a tip, when you don’t need those extra long legs, keep them fastened inside the cover for greater stability.

2. Tripods have a centre column which will allow you to raise it height when needed. But wait, did you try extending the legs first? Well yes, in the previous point we did tell you extending the legs will give a little less stability, but then what’s the use of having a tripod if you can’t raise it anymore higher to get good photos. So extend the legs first, and then if needed, extend the centre column.

3. Keep that tripod of yours on a steady and sturdy surface. Make sure it doesn’t wobble. Make sure even a slight breeze won’t topple it. It may sound quite amateurish to give such advice but you will be amazed how many mishaps professional photographers have had because of this.

4. If you want to place your camera tripod on a surface which is slightly unsteady, like on heavy vegetation, on sand or at the beach, then take some simple precautions to prevent it from becoming unbalanced and falling face first. Either forcefully push it down so that it finds ground, or use snow shoes (not yours, but ones that are manufactured specially for tripods) to stabilize it.

5. Another seemingly “oh please” advice – once you are done with clicking photographs, remove the camera from the tripod before you sling the stand over your shoulder and move on to the next location. It takes merely a few seconds and is way better than smashing the camera accidentally on a wall or tree, or risk the camera falling off. 

World's #1 Photo/Video Uploader

Backup & Transfer your Photos in Minutes

Automate backup & migration of your photos & videos with support for all top services.

(283 reviews)

Trusted by users in 125+ countries.

95,000+ PicBackMan Users

95,000+ Users Trust PicBackMan To Backup Precious Memories

money back guarantee
Kip Roof testimonial Kip Roofgoogle photos flickr
PicBackMan does exactly what it's supposed to. It's quick and efficient. It runs unobtrusively in the background and has done an excellent job of uploading more than 300GB of photos to 2 different services. After having lost a lot of personal memories to a hard drive crash, it's nice to know that my photos are safe in 2 different places.
Julia Alyea Farella testimonialJulia Alyea Farella smugmug
LOVE this program! Works better than ANY other program out there that I have found to upload thousands of pictures WITH SUB-FOLDERS to SmugMug! Thank you so much for what you do! :) #happycustomer
Pausing Motion testimonialPausingMotionsmugmug
I pointed PicBackMan at a directory structure, and next time I looked - all the photos had uploaded! Pretty cool. I use SmugMug and while I really like it, the process of creating directories in is pretty laborious when you need to make 80+ at a time. This was a breeze. Thank you!
Gavin Whitham testimonialGavin Whithamflickr
PicBackMan was really easy to setup and has been running for 3 days now backing up all my locally saved photos to Flickr. My photos are really valuable to me so it's great to be able to have them easily backed up to a secure location.
 Jim Griffin testimonialJim Griffinsmugmug
It's AWESOME!! I have tens of thousands of pictures...and they are now successfully uploaded to SmugMug, where they are safely backed up, and I can edit and organize them. If you are hesitating about using PicBackMan, hesitate no longer...try it...and you'll be glad you did!!
close icon
World's #1 Photo/Video Uploader

World's #1 Free Photo/Video Uploader

PicBackMan has everything you've ever wanted to backup your photos or migrate/transfer from one account to another. No feature left behind!

(283 reviews)
Trusted by users in 125+ countries.
  • Maintain Folder StructureMaintain Folder StructureUpload to your online accounts & keep your folder structure as you have it.
  • Sub-folder SupportFolders & their sub-folders are automatically picked up.
  • Smart De-dupeDe-dupes photos before uploading so you don’t have duplicate copies.
  • AutomaticPicBackMan monitors & automatically uploads from connected folders.
  • PrivacyPrivacyAll uploaded photos & videos are always marked as private by default.
  • RAW FilesComes with support for RAW files for uploads as well as transfers.

“Your pictures are scattered. PicBackMan helps you bring order to your digital memories.”

the wall street journal
close icon
One Uploader for All Services

One Uploader for All Services

PicBackMan is the only tool you will need to backup to one or more of the top online photo and video services.

(283 reviews)
Trusted by users in 125+ countries.
Google Photos

Google Photos

Flickr

Flickr

SmugMug

SmugMug

Dropbox

Dropbox

Google Drive

Google Drive

pCloud

pCloud

OneDrive

OneDrive

youtube

Youtube