Not sure if this helps anyone, but one of my reason for going to Bird Fair was to look at long lens brackets for my tripod (Manfrotto). I've been looking for quite a while on these and there seem to be a few on the market, Wimberley and Kirk spring to mind but the price seems a bit steep. Manfrotto do a similar thing but say it's for monopods but having spoken to the technical chaps a tripod works just as well so having tried one at Bird Fair I decided to part with the cash and give it a go. I've just used it this weekend for the first time in anger and I have to say what a revelation. Using with a Nikon 300mm F4 and 2x teleconvertor you really need something stable and this seems to work really well and whilst panning feels very solid and easy to track birds in flight (with a bit of practice). Hope this helps anyone looking for similar.
Can not agree more, have the big Gimbals for years and whilst good the Manfrotto 393 is value for money, and have found it more stable than my other stuff with the 600mm lens on board. Would say though, don't expect to mount it on a tripod that is not up to carrying the weight of your gear and expect miracles it dont work.
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