I’m a two-camera shooter, especially at weddings. I have to have those two bodies to allow me to quickly access at a minimum my wide angle and zoom lenses without missing any of the critical action – the look on dad’s face when he sees his daughter for the first time, the groom’s face when he first sees his beautiful bride coming down the aisle, the first kiss… But man, dealing with two big cameras hanging from your neck is hard! They get tangled up, so it’s hard to get the right one up to your eye, and the one with my 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM lens is HEAVY! After a long shooting day, my back, neck, and shoulders can hurt for days. So I was very interested the first time I saw an ad for the Black Rapid RS DR-1 Double Strap! It distributes the weight of your two cameras across both shoulders instead of your neck, keeps them separated on either side of your body so they don’t bump into each other and get tangled up, all while allowing you to quickly draw whichever one you want up to your eye. So while you might think that spending $130 on a camera strap is over the top, for me, it’s well worth the money! Anyway, I ordered it a few days ago, and it arrived today! Here are some photos so you can live my excitement with me! I’ve got two shoots on Monday so will try them out for real then, but for the moment, I can say it’s COMFORTABLE! This strap is totally going to save…literally…my neck!
The RS DR-1 Double Strap is also compatible with several mods that attach to the front of the straps and hold cell phones, camera batteries, etc. I haven’t bought any of those yet, as I wanted to see the strap first, but a cell phone holder will definitely come in handy. I’m not sure if it will hold compact flash cards, but’s that’s also what I would want.
The Double Strap can be converted into a single strap, but if you’re a single shooter, check out Black Rapid’s dedicated single strap products:
- Black Rapid RS-4 Single Camera strap, with pockets for memory cards
- Black Rapid RS-5 Single Camera strap with zippered pockets and a compartment for larger cell phones. The area is closed up by a silent magnetic clasp, which I think is pretty cool.
- Black Rapid RS-7 Single Camera strap, compatible with the mods I mentionned earlier (BRAD-BlackRapid Arm Defense MOD, Joey J-1 MOD, and Joey J-2 MOD)
- Black Rapid RS WS-1, specially designed for WOMEN. This one isn’t available yet, but it’s coming this summer!
Hi Lori, thanks for sharing your thoughts! I tested the strap on two shoots on Monday for a total of about five hours. I was wearing two Canon EOS 5D Mark II cameras, one with the 24-105mm f/4L IS USM and the second with the heavy Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM with a 2x extender, which made it even longer and bulkier. But it was still manageable. They basically just hang down – when squeezing by people, I’d just rest my hands over the bodies. One thing to be careful of though is kneeling down or sitting on the ground. If you don’t pay attention, your lenses and bodies could smack the ground.
But overall, at least for the moment, I wouldn’t change anything about the design. I do wish that the straps have the zippered pockets with the silent magnestic clasp that the RS-5 has. And since I bought the strap, I found out from another photographer that Sun-Sniper makes a single camera strap with steel wire so it’s slashproof. That’s kind of cool too, and I’d welcome that feature in Black Rapid’s double strap.
Anyway, I definitely love the strap. Five hours wearing two heavy bodies and lenses, and not a sign of soreness in my back, shoulders, or neck!
Thanks for this post, Irene! If you could describe and design a perfect next version of this product, what would the features include? I’ve not yet shot with two camera bodies, but this design makes me wonder if I’d wack a camera into something sitting on my hips like that… and yet I don’t have an immediate solution in mind. Thoughts?
Wow! A really useful review, especially with the photo. Thanks!
Chuck