To camera strap or not

After years of using a camera strap I'm wondering if it is time to say goodbye.

Often the camera is in a holster-bag or messenger-bag. So the risk of dropping the camera is kind to taken care of there.

It can get in the way of screwing the camera into a tripod base plate, and in strong winds will flail against the tripod. Which isn't great for long exposures or video recordings.

I've attached it to my Tamron 150-500 and that seems a more sensible use for it.

Currently running the camera with no strap and it doesn't seem to bother me. Strange after years of using one.

Still wondering if a hand-strap (like the Peak Design CL-3 Clutch) might be a nice compromise.

So has anyone else said goodbye to their camera straps?

Sort of yes and no. For years I have already used camera strap quick release solutions and hand straps. I have also used double camera harnesses that work best when the attachment point is in the bottom of the camera or lens collar and then it is obviously better to remove the neck strap. And when I use 200-600G lens, then the neck strap is usually attached to the lens rather than the camera. Although I use Peak Design Anchor Links that make the change from the lens to the camera easy, quite often I am lazy and operate the camera without neck strap when I remove the big lens and switch to something smaller. There is still the hand strap (usually PD Clutch, although I have also few cheaper handstraps, some with a wrist strap) that helps to maintain the grip. However there seems to be one situation where I'm little unsure about operating without a neck strap and that it is when changing between (smaller) lenses: if the camera is hanging on the neck it is easy to keep one lens in one hand and another lens in the other hand, but if you need to keep one hand holding the camera that complicates things a bit.

XKAES wrote: Hand grips are great, especially for small cameras, but not in situations where you need to use your hand for other purposes -- like putting a camera on a tripod.

Interesting, I would say they are more useful for gripped cameras - I used them with the A900 with grip and the Canon 1Ds. None of my current cameras have a grip, so, I do not use any handgrips.

I usually start using my cameras without straps until I go out with the camera and just one lens - going light means no bag and then it is nice to be able to simply throw the camera over my shoulder.

Not really an answer I think...

I was talking about what sometimes is called hand straps, like the hand strap E1. Minolta had also one. It allows you to just keep the camera in your hand and forget it. Like you can do with lighter cameras.

I'm with you -- hand STRAPS are great, as long as you don't need to use your hand for something else -- which seems to be MOST of the time!

But I have no idea what "a neck strap that's infinity looped on my wrist" means. Can you explain?

I have Peak Design quick releases and both a strap and a wrist strap, which I interchange as needed. Also a cotton carrier hand grip, which stays on all the time. Gives me a much better grip. I need it, kind of clumsy. haha Seriously, I broke my neck in an auto accident in 1998. Sometimes the neck strap is too much and sometimes my hands, especially the right, goes numb and I need more stability.

So it's cotton carrier hand grip + PD neck OR wrist strap.

Edited by Dena - 15 November 2021 at 04:40

Loving my neck strap with quick release buckles that can be connected together without the main strap - easily turns into a 'wrist strap'.

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71M-JizSQBL._AC_SL1000_.jpg