Problem is the tripod sucks. I need a better one.
I bought the ones that attach to your lens, which could be the issue.
The ones I have are the rings that attached to a lens. That's what I used to take the photos above. Hand held, no tripod, since 3 out of 4 of my subjects were moving or about to move

I just played with the shutter speed and ISO, I tend to go for a higher shutter speed to compensate for hand held and adjust ISO as needed.
Since it's manual focus with my rings I also auto focus to the best of my ability, then take a number of shots in a row as I slowly move in and out just a tiny bit, that way I can pick the shot(s) that have the best focus. It's hard to try to keep up with the subject and make minor focus changes at the same time, I find this works better and it's not like I'm wasting film
