s§
I hope not. Arca-Swiss is utter chaos. you need an Excel sheet which you keep up-to-date on a weekly basis to list which plates work with which heads. I very much prefer the Manfrotto PL-200 system for general use, and the PL-501 system (the standard for video heads) for big video heads. Very secure and fast with very little chance you may make a mistake when you're in a hurry.
Hermann
Nonsense.
Arca-Swiss is not chaos if you use proper parts. RRS, Kirk, Markins, Wimberley and most others including cheaper chinese products work very well. The only parts I have encountered that do not work as intended come from Gitzo and Sirui. They have introduced silly custom safety pin solutions (improvements?) which often makes normal combinations incompatible. Most Arca plates, have safety screwheads in the ends as a safety measure. This works without pins, springs and other delicate parts and works very well with most standard clamps = clamps adapted for plates with screwheads. Sirui and Gitzo “Arcastyle“ clamps require their own custom plates and may or may not fit standard Arca plates. If standard Arca plates fit they must be longer than necessary due to the lack of screwhead channels in the clamps. Removal of the safety pin in the clamp may also be required. Custom safety pins are not necessary with properly designed clamps. My Sirui clamp uses a springloaded pin in one location, my Gitzo “Arca” video head uses a fixed safety screwhead in another location.
Proper Arca compatible parts should be recognized as such. It’s a pity that a few manufacturers make their own custom variations pretending that they are Arca compatible when in fact they are not. The clamping channel dimensions may be Arca but the rest is not! If you understand how Arca-Swiss clamps and plates are supposed to work is it not difficult to spot the “fakes”.
With heavy equipment it is big advantage if the clamp channel can be loaded from above. Inserting the plate from the end of the clamping channel is really akward and should best be avoided.
Arca and other plates have to be long enough to allow proper balancing of the equipment. Some manufactures obviosly do not understand that. Plates have to be attached with two screws to scopes and lens feet to avoid twisting, a location pin is simply not good enough. My big Kowa scope has provision for two screws, thanks for that! My 65mm Swaro scope has not.
The nice thing about the Arca system is that it works with spotting scopes, lens feet and plates, camera plates, focusing rails, l-brackets, cages, flash brackets and a lot of other things. Manfrotty video heads may work for video, long tele lenses and spotting scopes but very little else. I use both cameras and spotting scopes and want tripods and heads to be usable for both, from long tele to macro.
Regarding Arca-Swiss as standard from Gitzo/Manfrotto. I hope not. If they adapt the “standard” they will probably only add to the confusion with further stupid incompatible variations of a really good concept.
