This is a story of a solid product with even better customer service. We often make noise when things go wrong. I think it’s important share the good stories as well. My story has to do with a photography gimbal head.

ASMP meeting

I attended a monthly American Society of Media Photographers get-together. We meet, swap stories and share new gear ideas. Networking with your peers is a great way to expand your knowledge. In addition you learn from others mistakes and pick up ideas on gear that can help you do your job better at a good price.

The GH25 gimbal head

photography gimbal for birding
Promaster Professional Gimbal Head with Lumix G9 and Leica 100-400mm lens. In my opinion this is the best value photography gimbal for the money.

A fellow photographer brought one of these pieces of gear in. It was a gimbal head for mounting a long lens. As I have been photographing wildlife I thought I’d check it out.

When I felt the smooth movements and the quality of the build I was impressed. Afraid to ask the price, I did anyway. I thought, “You have to be kidding!” It was surprisingly quite reasonable for the quality build. So I bought one.

Gimbal head in use

This head worked beautifully. The smooth movements of the gear made it easy set the friction (speed of movement) and to track wildlife. As I worked with it I realized the movements are so fluid that I also ended up this in place of my former fluid panning head when capturing some video.

The model was the GH25 Professional Gimbal Pan Kit from Promaster for about $300. (You could leave the pan head out and get only the gimbal for $249; see photo above.)  I was very impressed. This piece of kit helped me to steady my camera to capture a set of images I attempted many times in the past. Witness the hummingbird image headlining this post.

I used device quite a bit. But, one day with my camera and lens mounted on the photography gimbal arm, I was trying to photograph still images in-between some panning. There was some play in the upper gimbal arm when I tried to lock it down. Not pleasant. Up until this point I was extremely happy with the kit.

snadhill cranes bird photo
Tracking the Sandhill Cranes was a piece of cake with this set up.

Here’s where the story gets really good

Upon return to the studio I sent an email to ask if this was proper behavior for the gimbal. I expected a return email in a few days. Instead, the phone rang about seven minutes later. After quizzing me a bit, I was offered a suggestion for an adjustment. I hung up and tried the adjustment. No luck. Made a call back. I was told I could take the gimbal to any dealer for an immediate exchange. When we looked up possible dealers my closest was over 100 miles away. Bummer.

Not so fast. As soon as Promaster realized that was the distance and before I ever said anything he immediately exclaimed, “Oh man, I don’t want you to have to drive over 200 miles for the exchange. I’ll have one sent out to you from the warehouse.”

And it was it was in my hands a few days later. Customer service and standing behind your product doesn’t get better than that.

Yours in Creative Photography, Bob