Tripod Worthy

Growing up in the desert that is Southern California, I suppose it is only natural that I have been fascinated with succulents most of my life. I even remember doing an experiment in my basic biology class in which I measured the rate of transpiration of a cactus. The trick there was not to allow the thorns to punch a hole in the plastic covering. To be quite honest, I prefer photographing succulents to measuring their mass over time. The specimen shown here seems to be doing quite well as evidenced by the new growth. This morning, I confess that I was simply too lazy to dig out a tripod. Over the years, I have assembled quite a collection of them, but they are buried in a storage area under my collection of camera bags.

The Tripods

In general, I don't like carrying around a tripod. If I'm working from the car, and happen to have tossed the thing onto the back seat, there's a real chance that I could possibly use it. Hiking, not so much. I did once see a set of hiking sticks that featured a camera mounting plate in the handle and an expandable foot that unfolded into a mini-tripod, but it cost over $600. Luckily, it was on backorder at B&H. These days, many cameras have pretty amazing image stabilizers built in, so mostly the problem is solved, at least as far as I am concerned. If I'm honest, the only tripods that I ever found particularly interesting were the ones featured in the series of children's books by John Christopher, the Tripod trilogy, but those tripods were pretty terrifying. Hmm.