Tripod

Three legs, a head, and a plate that clips onto the camera. The head decides how the whole thing feels: a ball head levels quickly and suits stills, while a fluid head has damping in it and gives pans that do not judder. For talking-head filming the tripod is doing something specific, which is holding an identical frame across a whole shoot so cuts between takes are invisible. Buy heavier than seems sensible. A light aluminium tripod with a 70-200mm lens on top wobbles every time somebody walks past it.