Tripods for Astrophotography

You can get away with using a cheap plastic Chinese tripod for a while. But if you get serious about photography, you are going to want a good tripod.

Mini Tripods

• Oben TT-100 Table Top Tripod and Mini Ball Head 
• Manfrotto PIXI Mini Table Top Tripod 
• JOBY GorillaPod 3K Flexible Mini-Tripod with Ball Head Kit 

Camera Tripods

• Sirui W-1004 Waterproof Aluminum Alloy Tripod 
• Slik 700DX Pro Tripod Legs 
• Manfrotto MT290XTA3US 290 Xtra Aluminum Tripod 

Mount Tripods

• Losmandy Lightweight Tripod 
• Losmandy Folding Heavy-Duty Tripod 
• Baader Aluminum T-Pod Tripod 

Ball Heads

• Manfrotto 494 Center Ball Head 
• Oben BE-117 Ball Head 
• Sirui K-40X Ball Head 

Altazimuth Heads for Star Trackers

• Sky-Watcher Equatorial Wedge Base 
• William Optics Vixen Style Base Mount 

Cellphone Holders

• Ulanzi ST-02S Smartphone Tripod Mount 
• Sunwayfoto CPC-02 Professional Mobile Phone Clamp 

Depending on its use, we will need to put different heads on a tripod to hold a smartphone, camera, long lens, or telescope and equatorial mount.

For astrophotography, we are interested in 3 basic kinds of tripods:

1. Mini Tripods with a mini ball head for cellphones and light DSLR and Mirrorless cameras with wide-angle lenses.
2. Camera Tripods with a ball head for a camera, or an altazimuth head for a star tracker.
3. Mount Tripods for an equatorial telescope mount.

Unless you have special needs, like you need to lug all your equipment in on your back on a hike, you don't really need a carbon-fiber tripod. They are lightweight and strong, but usually expensive.

Don't scrimp on a camera tripod. You may end up putting a star tracker on it with a telephoto lens, and that will require a solid tripod.

My story of Comet NEOWISE and the cellphone holder that shook in the wind.

The Bottom Line

A tripod is, literally, the foundation of everything else you put on top of it. Get a good one that will last a lifetime.