Joe,

In that case, forget about the plate, forget about the CF legs:

- You don't need much hand-held
- You don't need to pan at 200x zoom, tracking the progress of snail on the horizon
- You probably won't gain that much from the few seconds saved setting up the CF tripod.

The FSB-6 with 2-stage alloy legs and mid spreader will be ideal, and will not break the bank. The Sachtlers have real nice counterbalance adjustment. You don't want to mess around with springs in the field if you find it isn't right. The drag is just superb too. Sure, you could spend $5,000 on a tripod... but I don't think you'd get $4,000 of extra happiness!

I wouldn't worry about the FSB cell. Your FX7 will probably run all day on one Sony 970 battery, at most two batteries - that would run for, what, 10 hours!. You don't need extra power for lighting out there on the paintball field, so there's not a lot of need for it. Cheaper to add some more Sony batteries, I think.

Hear, hear............
 

I second that recommendation.


CS

The one advantage I saw to the CF legs, is maybe they'll absorb hits from paintballs better.

Because what often happens is the legs get shot by paintballs and there's visible shakes in the camera, although it's not THAT bad most of the time, it can still happen.

So instead of a much heavier tripod/setup If the CF legs would help absorb some of that it'd be nice.

I don't know though :)

But I've definitely narrowed my selection down, thanks for the help guys...

You could always wrap the alloy legs with cardboard, bubblewrap, foam rubber or something. Not much of an image, but hey, it would be cheap!

Hehe, I ended up ordering the CF legs anyways, the quick-setup, and I think I found the one with the larger plate (not the touch-n-go) for better counter-balance options. $1600 after shipping

It's a $200 difference, but I'm not that concerned.

also ordered like $700ish in accessories for the FX7, Tripod and the HC5 I just bought off here :)