So, as my co-worker beside me works on finding a tripod for a customer who insists on flip-locks over twist locks, I thought I should take a moment to talk about my thoughts on these two popular ways of telescoping tripod legs.

Twist locks are actually my preferred method, I find them faster, more comfortable, and considerably less likely to end in me yelling profanities after catching some soft, fleshy bit of my finger in a lever of DOOM.

However, some people have had problems with over-tightening twist locks, which strips them and makes keeping their camera tripods upright a very difficult chore. Flip locks are much more difficult to do this with, in general you set the initial tension to the right level and then it’s either on or off.

Maybe I just don’t trust flip locks because I’ve had the mechanism inside them snap while pulling the level down, which made me quite unhappy. I don’t tend to be much of an over-powering dude, so I’ve never killed a twist lock. To each their own, though.

If you like twist locks, Induro and Gitzo are big into those.
If you like flip locks, why not peep out some Bogen Manfrotto tripods, or maybe some Sliks?