Ultra-lightweight Carbon Fiber Tripod from K&F Concept Review
Hot on the back of my recent review into the K&F Concept Nano series filter kit, I’ve been sent this Ultra-lightweight Carbon Fiber Tripod to have a look at. As someone who likes to get out and about with my landscape photography, getting my hands on such a tiny tripod was quite exciting, particularly as this K&F Concept offering also has the interesting ability to also act as a mono pod with an extremely modular design.
Other than it’s tiny size, and ultralight profile due to being made of carbon fibre, this little tripod has the fun ability to be completely dismantled and put together again as though it were made of lego. Each of it’s legs, it’s central extender and it’s head can all be removed to create mono pods, tall tripods, upsidedown tripods and I wouldnt be surprised if it can do more beyond what I found it can do.
Hikers is where this Ultra-lightweight Carbon Fiber Tripod has been marketed as it weighs 2.2lbs, or 997g and when carrying all that camera gear on 4 hour long hikes – the tripod is one place you can certainly do some good for yourself in limiting it’s weight.
I personally have used such ‘travel’ tripods made by manfrotto as the 260 xtra and the ‘be free’ range whenever I’ve head out on photo hikes, for the primary reason being that I’ve always considered a more study tripod to be the superior option – despite them weighing 3-4x the weight of something like this Ultra-lightweight Carbon Fiber Tripod from K&F and while convential wisdom says that is true, truth is that I have never actually held one of these little tripods and used them.
The BA225 tripod from K&F offers a tiny little package that feels like nothing hanging off the back of your hiking bag when compared to my other hiking tripods I may use, and that alone makes me want to use it more out in the field – however probably not at it’s full 60″ (152cm) height as quite frankly, despite it’s rated load capacity of 8kg, sticking $15k worth of camera equipment on top of it fully extended while teetering over a cliff face isnt my idea of ‘safe as houses’
BA225 60” Ultra-lightweight Carbon Fiber Tripod
That said though I do very much like it’s sturdiness when not fully extended, which is what I use my tripods most at anyway, to get close down, level with the water or something in the foreground. The great thing about this little tripod is that I can also invert it’s legs so that the camera can be set hanging upside-down below the central extender pole. This would allow your lens to get as close to small objects on the ground as possible. This is a feature that is only available on tripods many times it’s price point – and they usually are a lot more heavy.
The other feature I’ve found really handy with this offering is the abilty to cquickly convert the tripod into a mono pod – perfect for those of us who also head out to produce videography, or simply need a bit of stability, but mobility when shooting widelife like birds. This is a feature which I feel make this Ultra-lightweight Carbon Fiber Tripod a big win in my book as I haven’t come across this feature in the past!
Usually carbon fiber tripods come at a huge premium in price, but not the BA225 from K&F Concept. Priced at a very reasonable ~AU$135 while currently on sale, this would be a perfect way to get your hands on a very capable, versitile and neat looking bit of kit to help you out while hiking, or whenever weight is a consideration – like baggage limits on airplanes.
This tripod is not designed to help out much in a studio environment – despite me filming the simple upboxing above in a studio; or any location you’d be able to simply drive right up to and photograph – a heavier, studier tripod would better suit for seomthing like that – but this tiny tripod from K&F Concept is more geared towards those who really go off the beaten track a bit for their photography – and for that I’m quite excited to make good use of it! I’m sure my back will thank me.