Top critical review
2.0 out of 5 starsIt's the only tripod mount available for this lens. That's why I'll keep it.
Reviewed in the United States on May 9, 2023
I shoot primarily wildlife and have been tag teaming an R5 with 100-500mm and an R7 with 100-400mm using the R5 primarily for stills and the R7 for video. While the 100-400mm is light enough that it doesn't stress the lens mount with the camera mounted to the tripod, the balance is really bad and it can be difficult do subtle adjustments on the fly. So I decided to give the iShoot collar a shot.
After getting an empty Amazon shipping envelope the first time I finally got the collar Sunday.
First impressions, two major negatives, one expected one not:
1. The collar does not rotate because of the controls (expected)
2. The lens must be removed for the collar to be put on/taken off (unexpected)
I've bought aftermarket collars for non-collared lenses back in my Nikon days (like for the 70-200mm f4) and they all could be added and removed without removing the lens. That this one cannot is something I should have anticipated if I looked hard at the images, but that it's not means that either I need to remove the lens in the field to add it, or I need to shoot handheld with it on and it's very much in the way. My issue with having to take the lens off is that wildlife shooting isn't always in the most docile of conditions - wind blowing, pollen, dust, and sand flying - the idea of opening up both the lens and body to those things is troubling.
So that's the major thing. One minor hiccup is that the placement and length of the foot only really balances when the lens is fully extended to 400mm. Again, given the weight of the body and lens this could have been anticipated and if it remains problematic I can actually go to a solution I had tried before buying the collar and use a longer rail extended back towards the body to allow me to reposition the camera on the mount. This requires removing the nuts on the bottom of the arca mount but that's expected. In one of the Amazon photos it shows the foot at almost equal level with a gripped R5/6, but I don't have that option with the R7, so when placed on a table/seat it's balancing on the heal of the foot and the back edge of the camera, and there's really no good way to set the camera down without it being wobbly.
The other minor hiccup is the switch access. The lock switch is not nearly inaccessible with anything but small fingers as the collar is close to the camera grib and I can actually imagine some folks getting blisters from fingers rubbing on the collar if you have sausage fingers like me. On the other side, with the collar pressed all the way forward it seems like the forward edge of the switches are covered slightly while the back edge is clearly visible making the switches slightly harder to access when they are in the AF and ON positions, but they are still accessible.
Otherwise? It does what it's supposed to and is the only current option I can find that solves the pseudo-balancing of this lens on a tripod with an R7. For that reason I'm likely not going to keep it, but it's a 2/5 product for me at this point. If they hinged it at the top so I could add/remove it with the lens attached to the camera it would be a 4. The rest could be fixed, but I don't know whether it's worth their time for the limited market? I hope so.
Note: while this review is written specifically for use with the R7 the issues I point out, with the possible exception of access to the lock switch, remain when connected to an R5 or R6.
