Looking for interesting and robust alternatives for my vertical setup, I came across the following, items which seemed to offer great stability at reasonable cost:
- Proaim 19-15mm Camera Base Plate, ARRI Standard Dovetail Tripod Plate
- https://store.sirui.com/products/compatible-baseplate-set-sc-bps
The issue with the Canon macro lens is, that the tripod clamp attaches to the lens’s outer shell, which is relatively flexible. Supporting the front part of the lens improves stability a lot…and now, the Novoflex rail is beginning to be the weakest part of the rig. That’s why I looked for something sturdier. Instead of the Novoflex rail, I used a generic Arri dovetail baseplate:
Here, we got a 12 inch baseplate. It allows the capture of FF to MF format material with a full frame camera and also to take cropped captures with an APSC-Camera. All this with a lens that goes to 1:1. I could get smaller crops with e.g. a 2:1 Venuslens/Laowa macro lens, but I have no need for that at the moment.