Neewer LiteTrip 35 Carbon Fiber Travel Tripod Review | The Value Option?

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Hi, I'm Dustin Abbott and I'm here to give you a review today of one of the maybe more
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accessible and less expensive travel tripods that come in a carbon fiber design and that
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is from Neewer. Neewer is very popularly on places like Amazon with a lot of different products that are
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a little bit more friendly in terms of their price point than what some of the more boutique
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brands offer. So this is the Light Trip 35 carbon fiber travel tripod
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It retails right now for about $215 US dollars but there is an instant $50 discount right
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now so that puts it at about $165 US dollars. Now when you consider the fact that some of the carbon fiber travel tripods that I've
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reviewed have been upwards of $600 US dollars, that stands out as being a pretty remarkable
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value being 3-4 times less than what those cost. So the question of course is, is this a tripod that is worth using
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I'm going to dive through its various feature sets, give you some things that I like, some
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things that I don't like and offer up a conclusion as to whether or not you should consider the
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Neewer Light Trip 35 carbon fiber travel tripod for your own personal use
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Let's dive in. So let's start by giving you a run down of the specs here
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This tripod weighs in at 2.5 pounds, that's 1130 grams so it still feels very lightweight
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It's not the lightest one that I have reviewed. I've reviewed quite a number of these at this point
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Not the lightest but it does feel very very lightweight while maintaining a nice balance
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of still feeling very sturdy. It can support up to a 22 pound or 10 kilogram payload and so you can see in the opening
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sequence this being my heaviest combination at the moment. I had no problem in supporting that in either horizontal or vertical shooting positions
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Zero issues there. So for most people in most situations practically this is going to support whatever gear you
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throw on top of it. Now when it's fully retracted position it goes as small as 19 inches, that's 49 centimeters
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and it's minimum length. It does utilize a peak design style wedge leg design rather than a circular leg design
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and that does allow it to fold up very very tight. It's only 2.2 inches or 5.5 centimeters in diameter and so it does allow for a very narrow
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footprint when it's stored which is the advantage of this design. And I've always found with at least the peak design ones and I think it's true here as
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well there's something about this design that does feel a little bit extra sturdy and so
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I am partial to it. Now if you use the included short center column you can go down as low as 6.4 inches or 16.5
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centimeters to get down low for doing macro or tabletop type work
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Now the included QR plate here it is ARCA compatible and it is also compatible with
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peak design products and so it's pretty clear that they've been intentional about not only
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utilizing some of the design I think philosophies of peak design but also ensuring some compatibility
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with things like a peak design capture clip for carrying your camera and so I do appreciate
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that as a peak design user that if I'm using their quick release plate it is going to be
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compatible with some of the other products that I am using. The actual ball head itself is very nice in its design
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It is fully removable and also replaceable. There's a nice bowl here to where you could implement other things as well
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It also includes a number of accessories even at being at a lower price point so obviously
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it comes with this nice padded case for carrying everything and inside there's actually also
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a pouch that has a zipper on it that allows you to store all of the extra accessories
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that come with it. So I've already mentioned the shorter center column that you can utilize for that
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It also comes with a unique device here that can be used both as a grip and I have used
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it for that just out of curiosity. So a way to carry a camera or for that matter even to carry a phone that is practical and
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helpful but then also it is a phone holder that allows you with a lot of room to accommodate
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different sizes of phones. So it utilizes the quarter inch accessory port here in the center top of the tripod
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head and so you can actually screw it down there and you can use it as a phone holder
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For that matter you could utilize one of the side. There is a total of three different expansion ports and so if you wanted to also maybe have
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a secondary recording of something, a main camera on top, secondary here, you could actually
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utilize that there for a different perspective. So it is a very handy little thing that is included there
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And the other thing that is included is also really unique, something that I've actually
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not seen with any of these before and it is another quick release plate that has a separate
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panorama head on it. And utilizing that and then the pano on the head itself allowed me to do really smooth
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panoramic moves even like circular shots as you can see here. You know not maybe practical in all situations but the ability to do those smooth pans is
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something that is superior to pretty much any of these other travel tripods that I have used
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So that is something I do give it high marks for. So that was one of the things actually that I did test
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I was interested in having these accessories and seeing how they would play out and so
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I did find that I could get really smooth pans as a part of that
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So that was certainly an area where it passed the test when it came to that
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Another one of the things I like to test with these tripods is the ARCA compatibility of
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these heads and that includes a number of things. Are they going to be compatible with for example quick release plates from other brands or
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maybe ARCA compatible tripod feet on lenses. And so what I found is that it's kind of a mixed bag when it comes to that
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It's obviously clearly designed to work with Peak Design plates which is good for me because
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I have those mounted on the bottom of all my cameras and so I could go on to that no
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problem using Peak Design quick release plates. Some of the other brand quick release plates that are more similar I could also use without issue
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What I where I did run into an issue is when it came to ARCA compatible feet on say this
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new Sigma 15mm fisheye lens that I just reviewed. I found that when I put it on there while I could get it in it wouldn't lock down properly
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and so as a byproduct there was still some movement back and forth. If I tried to switch into a vertical mode using just that tripod foot very likely the
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lens could have slipped out and that would have been a major problem. So you're going to want to be careful in what you try to put on there
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It is ARCA compatible but not fully ARCA compatible. It's kind of hit or miss depending on the design
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One of the other things that I like to evaluate is the distance between the actual legs at
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it's full extended out but normal position not trying to ratchet the legs out further
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because that has a lot to do with how stable the base is going to be for supporting gear
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So I found that as I was measuring between those I could get a little over 32 inches
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between the legs which was actually a little bit wider than what a lot of the competitors
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are. I've done this test with a lot of different tripods. The best in the travel tripod class continues to be Peak Design's travel tripod
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It's 37 inches so that's a significant amount larger and thus a more stable base but compared
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to a lot of you know Peak Design representing one of the most expensive in the class
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So compared to a lot of others this actually did fairly well in that regard
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I also did various tests with that phone holder. I found that it did work well and of course once you have it mounted on there the ability
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to use the ball head to put it in whatever position that you want was useful
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You could also utilize obviously not the separate quick release plate but this still does have
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a smooth panning action and you could do that though the weight is a little bit heavier
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so you could do a panning with the foam but I actually really like the addition of that
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other quick release plate because it's just a little bit smoother in its operation a little
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less resistance for that. And so and then I just use it in general
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I've used it for about a month for filming episodes for doing photography work and frankly
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in all of those things it works just fine with the exception of the fact that it didn't
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always work with all of the ARCA accessories that I was working with and so I actually
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during this time I tried to use it on two different Sigma lenses I was reviewing both
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of which had a tripod collar and foot and it as for the reasons I've already mentioned
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it didn't work quite well for that. So let's talk about some things I like and some things I don't like starting with things
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that I like. Obviously price is really attractive here. Carbon fiber travel tripods can cost easily two to four times more than this and so this
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feels like a really solid value for what you get. I also noted that it feels very sturdy and stable particularly if you're just using it's
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a five leg extension and so if you're just using you can get up to a really nice height
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already a very usable height and I found that at that point it was really really stable
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Now if you extend up the center column you introduce a lot less stability and it's not
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bad you know for what happens when you extend a slender center column instead of that solid
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base but I certainly preferred it without the center column extended and certainly even
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if it's extended extended a little bit and not to its full height. That's true for all of these
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It also has a surprising number of accessories included for being a very reasonably priced tripod
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So that's obviously a bonus you're getting I think a lot for your money here
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I also really liked that panning quick release plate it's something new that I've not seen before
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I've actually found it more useful than what I anticipated and found it to be something
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that I can reach for and of course obviously with this design it's something that you could
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use on multiple tripods as well and so that was a useful accessory included
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I also found that the kind of the design around it not just being an adapter to put a phone
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on but also to be able to use it as a grip I really like its actual use
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I do wish you know in some cases the phone holder is integrated into the design in some
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way you know Peak Design designs it to where it slides up the center column
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Hapey designs it to where it actually pulls out of the the base of the the head there
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I find those to be easy because you don't have to go and find an accessory
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They're built in they're right there and so you you always have them with you and so I would have preferred it to be integrated into the design some but I do think it is the actual
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accessory itself is really well designed and implemented it even has a cold shoe on it if
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you want to do further expansion so I do appreciate the inclusion of this
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While it may seem to be kind of counterintuitive for this company to integrate so well with Peak
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Design I as a Peak Design user I do appreciate that and I appreciate that compatibility across
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the board it means that I'm not having to try to find for example a another you know to either
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swap out a you know Peak Design quick release plate to go on this or if I'm using the quick
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release plate from this I don't have to worry about it not fitting into my capture clip or
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something like that so I do appreciate that integration. I also felt like the ball head for a travel tripod actually felt more robust and better
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executed than a lot of these that I've used. The materials here are nice it's clearly aluminum all throughout this and then of
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course you know going into the carbon fiber for the legs themselves everything seems to
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be quite nicely engineered and so that's fairly surprising at this price point
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I also really really like the design for the ratcheting of the legs this can be something
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that's a bit of a pain on some designs but this integration is really really well executed and
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so it's very quick very intuitive to get at and it is something that I really really liked
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Now ironically I love the ratcheting of the legs but my least favorite thing about the
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design is actually the leg locks. Out of the box they're extremely stiff there there's a lot of pressure that's there but
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the problem is is that there is actually no adjustment place on them and so my concern
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is is that over the process of time that these for one thing this is basically the only plastic
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thing that I can find here and so the fact that I think these are potential break points
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but also as they start to invariably loosen up over time which I think they will do the
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fact that there isn't really an adjustment point means that you can't retighten them
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nor at this stage could you loosen them a little bit to make them make there to be a
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little bit less resistance. I've found them to be a little bit uncomfortable I just did a polar plunge and I got a little
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bit of frostbite in the tips of my fingers so my tips my fingers are a little bit sensitive
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right now and I did not enjoy pulling at these with my fingertips at the moment because that
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resistance is a little on the heavy side. Another thing that I didn't love is that while it does fold up you know nice and compact
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it's not as compact as competing tripods and so at its you know minimum size it is still
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over 19 inches long and so that compares to like the most compact I recently reviewed
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Freewell's travel tripod it gets down under 17 inches the Hapey is 17.7 inches and of
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course the winner in this class is Peak Design's carbon fiber tripod and it gets down as small
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as 15.4 inches so you're talking about about four inches longer for this as opposed to
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the winner in the class which is the Peak Design and so again useful but it may stick
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up those extra few inches means that if I'm putting it in my backpack for example it's
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going to stick up a little bit higher than what some competing ones might
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The other thing that I'm a little bit critical of is the fact that yes you can remove the
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center column quite easily you just screw off the area where you hang your backpack
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from this hook down here and if you unscrew that it allows you to then loosen the center
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column and to pull it right out and so obviously you could invert that for shooting in a underneath
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position and you can also swap out to the short center column and so that you can get low down
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work. The problem is you do have to utilize an allen key to loosen off the ball head and so it
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it's not a tool-less operation to do that so it takes a little bit longer to do that swap maybe
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than what I would like. The other thing that I don't like is something I've already alluded to
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and that is that there is I think there's more arca related issues than what I have typically
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found with these travel tripods. It doesn't seem like there's a whole lot of range of adjustment
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in the actual quick release mechanism and so you basically need to be this width there's no
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ability to tighten or loosen it's gonna work within a very preset and I do like the locking
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mechanism I like it when when you're using a compatible quick release plate it's great but
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the fact that it's not as versatile means that in some situations I'm not going to be able to
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it with everything. So what's my conclusion? I actually think this is a really nicely made travel
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tripod outside of the leg lock mechanism which I am not a fan of. At the same time I will also
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freely admit there isn't really any killer app. I think that a lot of these that I've reviewed in
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recent years there's something about them that makes them really stand out you know they're
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either really really small or there's some really clever feature that's integrated in them. This
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basically has a lot of the features that other travel tripods have but it doesn't have anything
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that I would point to to say that's really unique to this this is the lone reason why you should buy
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it. So what is the most compelling reason to buy this? I think the actual answer is probably the
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price. This is a really strong value and you're going to be able to get into a carbon fiber travel
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tripod which means you're traveling lighter and carbon fiber is nice and stable when it comes to
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reducing vibration. That's great but your main reason to get in this is the fact that it is
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cheaper. I think that in many ways it mirrors a lot of the compelling aspects of Peak Design's
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approach travel tripod but at a much lower price point. It's not as good don't get me wrong it's
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not as good as Peak Design although there are a few areas where I really like it like when it
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comes to the execution of the ball head. It's not as short as what Peak Designs is but it is a more
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functional ball head than what Peak Designs is. I'm actually filming with the Peak Design travel
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tripod right now so if you're on a limited budget I don't know that I have used anything
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that costs less than this that has as much function and value as what this does. So this
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really does hit a sweet spot of the combination of price point and then the function and the
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performance of design and if that works for you then the newer Lightrip 35 is probably a really
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interesting option for you to consider and a travel tripod. I'm Dustin Abbott and if you look
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in the description down below you can find linkage there to a text review there's some
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buying links there and of course as always thanks for watching have a great day and let the light in

Neewer LiteTrip 35 Carbon Fiber Travel Tripod Review | The Value Option?

Dustin Abbott

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Neewer LiteTrip 35 Carbon Fiber Travel Tripod Review | The Value Option?

Dustin Abbott