I bought Tarion VT770 from Tarion directly rather than from Amazon. It’s not Amazon itself who sells it but a Chinese seller so you wouldn’t get all that Amazon protection buying from it. And getting from Tarion directly it was cheaper than from Amazon.
I am not a professional video maker and this is my first video tripod. Previously I was using a photo tripod with video head which was shaky when I did panning. So Tarion VT770 is much more stable. It’s a little shaky on full height but that makes it very high and would rarely be needed. When I extend only the middle section it remains very stable.
Tarion has many plastic pieces so the time will show how durable is it. Initially all plastic parts look solid so I hope they will serve for a long time.
To make horizontal panning really smooth I had to loose the triangle knob to the maximum (see photo) – and don’t forget to loose the lock clamp too. Then there was some noise during panning which was caused by the metal blocker used to block the panning (which is tightened by the lock clamp). I applied some silicon grease and the noise almost disappeared – see the photos below.
I’ve seen a comment somewhere about the issue with the camera getting on the way of quick-release plate locking-knob. Note that you can pull the knob and turn it down so it always remains away from the camera (see the photo).
Note that the tripod is heavy and bulky and is therefore not suitable for pedestrian travel. Also the bag isn’t very durable and arrived with a little hole made by tripod during transportation.
So in conclusion it’s a decent tripod overall with some minor issues that are easy to address.
I had a conversation with my friend a few days ago. We talked about how much our life changed in the last 10-15 years.