Manfrotto 244 Variable Friction Magic Arm with Camera Platform (#2929)

Product as described. Excellent experience.

Phenomenal piece of gear. Pricey but worth every penny!

The Manfrotto 244 Variable Friction Magic Arm comes close to being a jack of all trades: umbrella bracket, hair light, back light, camera mount, mic stand, monitor/iPad mount, etc. I mainly use it with a Super Clamp, allowing it to be securely attached almost anywhere. The ends are male light stand tips and fit standard 5/8" female light stand sockets. It makes an excellent light stand when used with the Manfrotto 003 Backlight Base.The friction wheel controls arm and ball joint tension simultaneously. So you always need two hands for adjustment: one hand on your gear to keep it from flopping and the other to control the wheel. With moderate fiction, movements are smooth but, once locked down, it holds a medium sized DSLR or light head without budging.I tried a friend's Magic Arm with the cam-lever. Same excellent build quality but the lever is more difficult to adjust than a friction wheel. You need to really muscle it too! However, I was surprised my Magic Arm arrived without the wheel installed. Probably Manfrotto wanted to reduce bulk and use a smaller box. No biggie, just spin the wheel on and you're golden. No assembly instructions provided or needed.I didn't find the camera bracket terribly useful and should have bought the Magic Arm without the bracket. I use a ball head (Sunwayfoto) to mount LED lights, mics or cameras: the Magic Arm has a little settle with heavy loads and a ball head allows fine adjustments after lockdown. To attach a ball head, screw a 1/4 to 3/8" male stud adapter, e.g., Manfrotto 118 Male Spigot into the arm's baby stud and screw the head on it. You could also mount the ball head directly on the bracket if you don't mind the extra weight and bulk.The Magic Arm is well designed, built like a bazooka and my most useful Super Clamp accessory. I'm often in cramped quarters and it works where light stands and tripods dare not tread.

I am finally finished making my captains chair with a Razor Enki and the Manfrotto super clamp system and the magic arms with camera attachment I've been trying all year and wasting so much money on different and much less viable solutions to mounting my glove80 split keyboards to my gaming chair. As it turns out you get what you pay for. These are expensive little steel rods, but they are sturdy as hell and worth every penny.

Cheap quality. Bought this hoping for a clean quick-release setup, but it ended up damaging my gear. The screw snapped clean off and left the threaded part stuck inside my Sony camera. None of the pieces were defective at first glance, but the metal clearly wasn’t strong enough for regular use. Now I’m having to go out of my way to find a shop just to remove it. Super disappointed—this mount caused more hassle than it’s worth. Not recommended for any serious setup

It took me a long time to find this. The sturdiest and most well engineered piece of equipment I've bought from Amazon. Worth every penny.I can't imagine holding a DSLR camera with anything else extend a tripod. For everywhere and anywhere you can't use a tripod, like a desk, use this

There are two studs on ball joints on either end of the arm. When the knob is turned counter-clockwise, the ball joints and the center 'elbow' all loosen. The loosing is gradual, so it won't suddenly collapse. Once you have it set, turn the knob clockwise and all the movable joints tighten. I was a little leery of hanging my DSLR in the air, but this arm locks up pretty solidly.Now I have a set point on my macro table for mounting the camera. Since focus and view angle is so critical in macro work, my tripod is a bit of a nuisance. This makes life a whole bunch more simpler. :)The arm and clamp combo are also being used where tripods are not permitted/practical but where a solid mount point (e.g.fence post) is available.Construction is solid, fit and finish are excellent and the usage is intuitive.The Superclamp in the photos is not included, but unless you already have a mounting strategy figured out, you'll need one.Quick edit: The knob on mine was fully assembled and there were no missing parts. Maybe they read the previous reviews.

It's a little heavier than I had anticipated, but since I will likely be using in scenarios where I can't use my Giotto CF tripod, it shouldn't be a big deal. I also purchased the Super Clamp 035RL to use with it and together they will fit the bill very nicely. The mechanics of the unit are very impressive, and, in a geeky sort of way, pretty cool. The one knob locks everything down rock solidly and holds like a vise. I'm using it with a D800 and various Nikkor lenses including the 14-24 f/2.8 and the 70-200 f/2.8 and, so far, it has performed exactly as I'd hoped.As I mentioned, my intent on purchasing this pair is for instances when I can't use my tripod. One example is for an upcoming trip to New York where I am planning to do some night shots form atop the Empire State Building and Top of the Rock (Rockefeller Center Bldg). On the Empire State Building there are bars and a cross-bracing system to which I can use the round clamp capabilities of the Super Clamp and the arm allows me to position the camera exactly where needed to shoot between the steel cabling. For the Top of the Rock, there are large clear panels with small vertical spacing between them to which I can, again, use the Super Clamp but add the wedges to the V-shaped main clamping surfaces to improve holding power on flat surfaces. Will certainly be the right support system for both of these setups. Looking forward to some outstanding imagery from the trip.