Flash 101: On-Camera Flash

Lisa's note: Things have been a bit busy at the Jeff and Lisa household lately, which explains the lack of posting. Things should be back to normal soon though. To the new subscribers, hi! Welcome to Beyond Megapixels. Feel free to browse through the popular posts, and the rest of the archives. With that out of the way, enjoy Jeff's article on the basics of flash photography.
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There are two ways for you to use your flash: on-camera and off-camera. There are pros and cons for both and we’ll tackle the biggest ones here to get you started on flash photography. Before I forget, when you go through other websites you might wonder why they use the word strobes rather than flash. It’s the same thing so don’t get confused.

ON-CAMERA

In Part 1, we will be discussing On-Camera flash. When on-camera flash is mentioned, the first thing that comes to most people’s minds is the tiny flash unit found in point-and-shoot cameras and entry-level DSLRs. What we’re referring to in this article are external flash units mounted on a camera's hot-shoe.

PROS

1. No red-eye. Since external flash units are about a half a foot away from your lens, the chances of red-eye happening are slim to none.

2. Portability and mobility. No don’t need to bring anything but your camera and flash unit. You also don’t need to move around to adjust the settings on your flash since it’s right there. You have flash capability in a moment’s notice.

3. Bounce your flash. Most external flash heads allow you to swivel it from left to right and up and down. This gives you the ability to bounce your flash to make the light hitting your subject softer and more flattering. Take note that if the surface of wall or ceiling you are bouncing from is not white then the light hitting your subject will have some tinge of the surface color

CC Photo by Okko Pyykko
4. ETTL metering. Electronic-Through-The-Lens or ETTL refers to how your camera meters a scene. It basically measures the light as it goes through your lens. Dedicated hot shoe flash units can make use of ETTL metering when it calculates how much flash is needed to properly expose your subject. This feature saves you a lot of time if you’re just starting out in flash photography since you don’t need to fiddle with the intensity of your flash.


5. Fill-flash mode. Fill-flash refers to the flash just giving off enough light to make sure there are no harsh shadows on your subjects. What happens is that your camera measures the ambient light and properly exposes for this while telling the flash to expose for the subject. Some manufacturers require you to activate fill-flash mode either in your camera or on the flash unit while some like Nikon and Canon automatically defaults to fill-flash when there’s enough light in the background.

6. Focus assist. Built in flash helps in auto-focusing (AF) by throwing off small bursts of light when ambient light is low to help the camera focus. This is really annoying and in my opinion could induce epilepsy. External flash units assist in auto-focusing by throwing off red light which is very faint and non-obtrusive. Below is a photo of the focus assist lamp on the Canon 430EX II.

CONS

1. Full-frontal light. The reason why on-camera flash photography looks so unnatural is that the light source is noticeably coming from the camera. This is not how we regularly see our surroundings unless you walk around with a flashlight attached to a helmet on your head. This problem is being slowly addressed by manufacturers by making complex algorithms to balance flash and ambient light. You can also try swiveling the flash head as mentioned above but that only works when you’re near something to bounce the light on which isn’t always the case.


CC Photo by trentroche
2. Shadows on the wall. As a rule of thumb, you should avoid using flash when the subject is near a wall since you will mostly likely end up with the subject’s shadow on it.


CC Photo by Beige Alert
3. Flash fall off. Flash fall off refers the situations wherein the subject was properly exposed by the flash but the background is completely dark. This is due to the simple fact that you cannot light the entire background with your flash unit.


CC Photo by Dawn Ashley
The most important thing to know when purchasing an external flash unit is that you need to make sure to buy one that works with your camera. A lot of bad things can happen if you place an incompatible unit on your camera’s hot shoe. If you're lucky then the only thing that could happen is that the flash will not fire but there have been incidents where either the flash or camera short-circuited. In our opinion, it’s better to buy one that’s the same brand as your camera.

Ready to take your flash photography to the next level? Stay tuned for part 2 when we discuss off-camera flash.

Related Reading:
How To Get Soft Diffused Light From Your Flash

Filters 101 (Part 2)

You can read the first part of this article here.

•DENSITY FILTERS

Density filters are like sunglasses that you would wear on a sunny day. They effectively darken the scene and are available in different strengths. The most commonly used type of density filter is the neutral density (ND) filter since it does not add any color cast. Density filters are necessary if you plan to capture motion blur on a bright day. Without it, the extended exposure necessary for capturing motion blur will cause you to blow out your highlights.

CC Photo by MmMmMmMatt
Landscape photographers use a specialized type of density filter called the graduated neutral density (GND) filter. A GND filter is shaded at the top part of the filter and slowly fades until the bottom of the filter is clear. This filter was designed to darken the sky in a photo without affecting the foreground. The two most popular GND filter variants are soft-step and hard-step filters. In soft-step filters, the transition between the shaded part to the clear part is very gradual and subtle which is good for horizons that are not completely flat. Hard-step filters have a more defined boundary between the shaded area to the clear area.


CC Photo by ccdoh1
GND filters are also available as both the threaded and the square filter version. It is better to get the square filter GND so that you can adjust exactly where the transition of the shaded to the clear area will be.

There are a lot of techniques in Photoshop that emulates the effect of a graduated neutral density filter like the one found in our previous article. Photoshop will only help accentuate what detail you managed to retain in the sky and not save a blown photo.


•POLARIZERS

Polarizers come in two variants: linear and circular. These variants do not refer to the physical shape of the filter but how it directs the light coming into your lens. Linear polarizers direct light waves into a linear fashion while circular polarizers direct light into a spiral or circular motion.

The only important thing to remember when buying a polarizer is that linear polarizers do not work with DSLRs or cameras that have the ability to auto-focus and auto-expose. This means that you have to focus and fix the exposure before you attach a linear polarizer to the lens. Circular polarizers, on the other hand, can be attached to the lens during metering and auto-focusing.

Polarizers darken the sky, the greens in the foliage and cut reflections in your photo. In my opinion, this is the filter that does the most for DSLRs. Polarizers attach to the front of the lens much like any other filter with the addition of another rotating element at the front of the lens. The rotating element at the front is what controls the amount of polarization. You can look through the viewfinder and see the amount of polarization while you rotate the filter.


CC Photo by OliverAlex
The effect polarization is also dependent on where your camera is pointed. The effect is at its maximum when the camera is aimed perpendicular from the rays of the sun. If you’re out taking photos at noon then the amount of maximum polarization would be at the horizon. Polarizers will exhibit no effect if it is aimed at the sun.

You should also use caution when using polarizers with wide angle lenses since the amount of polarization is different across the sky. Some parts of the sky will appear bluer than the rest if the angle of view of your lens is too wide. The photo below was taken with a lens set at 10mm. You can see that the sky is bluer at the center of the photo where maximum polarization is present.


CC Photo by J.Rosario

SOME NOTES ON FILTERS

1. Filters, not just density filters, will lessen the light entering your lens since it adds another element for the light to pass through. Be sure to check the specs of your filters to see how much it affects your exposure.
2. Filters will not affect how sharp your photos are unless your filter is dirty.
3. You can stack filters on top of each other to mix their effects. The rule of thumb is that you can use three filters at the same time before the quality of your photo is affected. Be sure to double check your lens’ manual if this holds true for you.


RELATED READING:
Filters 101
How to Fix Washed Out Skies

Filters 101

Filters are basically tools to modify the quality of light hitting your sensor. They used to play a more integral role in photography before digital cameras came along. Nowadays, a lot of people discount the importance of photographic filters thinking that they can replicate any effect they want during post-processing. This is not entirely true. There are some filters that can never be replicated on the computer no matter how good you are with Photoshop.

There are literally dozens of filter types available in the market today that can cause a first time buyer some confusion.This article will discuss some of the most basic and important types to help get you started.

FILTER MOUNTING

Filter mounting refers to how the filter attaches to your lens. The two most common filter mountings are threaded and the square filter system. Threaded filters are circular in shape and just screw on directly to the lens. Square filters require a filter holder to attach the filter to the lens.

Some types of filters, such as the protect filter, are available only as threaded filters while some like gradient filters are better used in their square form. These will be discussed further in the article.

FILTER SIZE

To find the filter size that's needed for your particular lens, you need to look at the front of the lens with all the marking on it and look for the symbol in the photo below.

CC Photo by William Hook
Different lenses have different filter sizes. This means that one size will definitely not fit all. To avoid having to buy the same filter for each type of lens you own, we suggest buying converters or step-up rings. Step-up rings allow you to attach a threaded filter that has a bigger size than that of your lens. The photo below is an example of a B+W step-up ring that attaches to a lens with a filter thread size of 72mm to a filter that is 77mm.

FILTER TYPES

• UV / PROTECT FILTERS

Protect filters do just that, protect your lens. It is basically just a clear piece of glass that screws on the front of your lens to protect it from dirt and scratches.

UV filters block ultra-violet light in a scene which can cause your image to lose some sharpness. Does it work? I have no idea. We’ve been taking photos for a very long time before we attach a UV filter to our lens’ and I have yet to notice a difference in image quality. We mainly use UV filters to protect the frontal element of our lens much like what a protect filter will do.

• COLORED FILTERS

Colored filters are classified by Wratten numbers with each number corresponding to a specific hue or color. The system was named after the Frederick Wratten who established a company in the early 1900's specializing in filters. You can see a listing of Wratten numbers with their specific colors here. These types of filters add color to the scene. The most commonly used colored filters for photography are warming and cooling filters. You can try the Cokin 81 series filters to warm up a scene or the 82 series filters to cool it down.

The practically of colored filters have gone down with digital cameras. You can get the same effect by playing around with your white balance setting. Check your camera’s manual on how you can enter a specific color temperature for white balance so you won’t be limited by the usual presets of daylight, shade, etc.

• CLOSE-UP FILTERS

Close-up filters are the way to go if you don’t want to spend on a dedicated macro lens. These filters enhance your lens’ magnification power by lowering the minimum focusing distance so you can move much closer to your subject. The filter’s strength is measured in dioptres with the weakest being +1 and the strongest at +10. Your lens’ focal length will also determine the magnification factor. For example, an object will appear larger if you use a 100mm lens with a +3 dioptre as opposed to using a 50mm lens with the same filter. The photo below is a close-up filter set from Hoya.


Of course the image quality will never be equal to that of a macro lens but close-up filters are still a lot better than cropping during post processing.

(To be continued...)

RELATED READING: How to Protect Your Lens

How to Make a Light Box and Macro Studio for Under $20

Ever wondered how pros take photos of random objects and make them look crisp and clean? The answer to that is a light box or what is sometimes referred to as a light tent. A light box is just simply a cube which is made out of a white translucent material. The object that is being photographed is placed inside and lighting is added to either the sides or the top of box. The walls of the light box acts as a diffuser which softens the intensity of the light and at the same time scatters it which greatly lessens glare.

Light boxes are commercially available for about $40 to $90 depending on the size. But here at Beyond Megapixels, we're all about saving money because A.) we don't have any, and B.) you're better off spending your money on something that you cannot build yourself like say, a 70-200mm f2.8, but we digress. We made our own. All in all, we spent less than $20 for the entire set up, INCLUDING the lights.

Things We Used:
1. Large cardboard box - $2.00
2. Tape
3. Tracing Paper - $1.00 or less
We used Japanese Paper. I'm not sure of the availability in your location or if it's called the same thing, but if you don't know what that is, you can always use tracing paper. You can even use tissue, if all else fails.
4. 500 watts halogen work light - $9.00
5. 300 watts halogen work light - $6.00
Most people who use halogen for their light boxes use this.
6. White poster board - $1.00 or less

PUTTING IT TOGETHER

1. Draw a square on three sides of the box. The margin should be about an inch or two away from the sides of the box.

2. Cut out the what you drew with a cutter. These windows are where your light is going to enter the box.

3. Cover the windows with tracing paper which will act as your diffuser.

4. Attach the poster board at the bottom of the box. Make sure you only tape it at the top part of your box so the paper will curve downwards towards the bottom. This will be your seamless white backdrop.

5. Put your work lights on both sides of the box. One can act as your main light and the other as your fill light.

We decided to use halogen because it is the cheapest work light that is strong enough to imitate strobes. Don't get anything less than 500 watts for your main light. It's better to have a light source that is too strong than one that is too weak. If you find that your lights are to strong then simply move the lamp farther from the box.

Halogen light is very yellow so you need to do a custom white balance reading inside the light box to eliminate any color casts. If you do not have an 18% gray card to do a white balance reading then you can shoot RAW and fix your WB during the conversion process or simply remove the color cast in Photoshop if you're shooting JPG. You can find instructions for doing that here.

Our gray card inside the light box

Below is a comparison of a photo taken with a 400D's auto white balance and a custom white balance setting using a gray card.

Camera set on Auto White Balance

Camera using custom white balance from a gray card

HOW A LIGHT BOX WORKS

The light box's main purpose is to wrap your subject in diffused light. Since all the sides are white, everything around the subject acts as a reflector. Since the light is completely in your control, you can dictate which part of the subject is lit, where the shadows will be, and how distinct or soft your shadows are. You will also get more detail, better depth, more defined textures and better color saturation. You can see this with the series of photos below.

Shot inside the light box using our living room's fluorescent light. The light is already pretty good because of the the light box.
50mm at ISO 100, f/13, 13secs

Shot with fluorescent light and fill-flash
50mm at ISO 100, f/13, 6secs

Shot using the two halogen work lamps. The elephants are lit from front to back and the texture of the wood really comes out. It also shows better contrast and the subject just leaps out of the background.
50mm at ISO 100, f/13, 1/15

Lisa's Notes:
1. Halogen gets very hot easily so don't let it touch the sides of your light box. I hear tracing paper is highly flammable. Be mindful of the heat and try your best not to burn the house down.
2. Use a tripod so you can shoot at ISO 100 and not worry about camera shake.
3. Save on electricity by composing your shot before turning on the lights.
4. With a little ingenuity and enough will, you should be able to build a similar setup for the same amount, or even less. Share your light box stories with us on the comments section, or shoot us an email. We'd love to hear from you.
5. On an unrelated note, there's a new poll up on the sidebar that's closing in a couple of days. Do pop in and join. Cheers!

Related Reading:
Removing Color Casts

How To Clean Your Lens

No matter how careful you are, sooner or later, your lens will get dirty. The first time you contemplate cleaning your lens can be very daunting as we found out a few days ago. Hopefully this guide can help you with the different options you have in getting your lens back to its pristine condition.

Blowers

Tour first line of attack should always be air. It's the least invasive of all your cleaning options since no contact is made with your glass. There are several blowers available in the market today that are specifically designed for camera lenses such as Giotto's Rocket Blower. These are designed with air valves that prevent dust from getting into the air chamber so that the air it blows out is clean. If you ask me though, anything that can blow out non-pressurized air is good enough to get dust off your glass such as an empty water spray as long as you aim the lens downward when you blow air onto it.

Brushes and Cloth

If you can't get the dust out with a blower then you can try using brushes. This is where you will definitely need to get one specifically made for lenses to avoid leaving scratch marks.

If you're dealing with something more than dust such as fingerprints or smudges then you will need to resort to cleaning cloths such as Pec*Pads. Cleaning cloths for lenses are usually made out of microfiber which are lint free and designed not to leave marks on your glass. However, before wiping your lens with a cleaning cloth, you will first need to get all the dust out by first using either a blower or a brush. Dust can leave marks or scratch the coating on your lens if its rubbed in hard enough.


Cleaning Solutions

If the smudge is still there after attempting to remove it with a cleaning cloth then you will need to use a cleaning solution. The best one that we can find that most pros use is the Eclipse Cleaning Solution. This fluid is specially formulated for lenses and is fast drying and residue-free. If you can't find this particular brand then make sure the one you get will not damage the coating on your lens.

Personally, I would choose not to use any cleaning fluids on any of my lenses. I'm always worried that the fluid might seep in between the glass the the front mount of the lens and get inside the barrel itself. I would rather bring the lens to a service center if a cleaning cloth can't get the dirt out.

We're giving a special shout out for the Nikon Lens Pen Cleaning System . We just recently received the Canon EFS 55-250mm lens (which we will be reviewing in the next few articles) and we were taking it out for a spin when Lisa accidentally touched the glass and left a fingerprint on it. My beautiful wife's graceful hands' fingertips are surprisingly oily. The smudge looked really bad and we were already thinking of bringing it in for servicing when we came across the Nikon Lens Pen on Amazon.com.

The pen itself has a retractable brush on one end and a felt tip on the other. We first started with the brush to remove all the dust on the glass and then started working on the fingerprint with the felt tip. Amazingly, we were able to completely remove the smudge after three passes. We definitely recommend this product as it is both cheap and compact. Our only beef with it though is they should have made a cap for the brush side. But taking into consideration the user reviews on different websites, this seems like the best lens pen option.


Needless to say, we've already gone through all our lenses and they're all brand spanking new clean.

Some Additional Notes on Lens Care

• Prevention is always the best way to care for your lens. Always leave the dust cap on when storing your camera or use a UV filter or lens hood.
• Avoid using cotton swabs to clean your lens since these can leave cotton fibers when you sweep it across the glass.
• If you get your fingerprint on your lens, immediately remove it from the camera body. The heat from the camera can literally cook the oils in the print and make it near impossible to remove.
• If you have a big collection of lenses, try using each one at least once every two weeks since believe it or not, it can grow fungus from non-use even if it's stored in a dry box. Fungus is one of the few things that can literally kill your lens.

Related Posts:
Lens 101
How to Protect Your Lens

How to Get Soft Diffused Light from Your Flash

The biggest drawback from using a flash is that it gives hard flat light. More often than not, it causes unflattering shadows, unnatural skin tones and makes your subject look like deer caught in the headlights. Most cameras now will let you adjust the intensity of your flash by playing around with the flash exposure control or by using Flash Fill Mode. You can get softer light by doing this but it will still be flat. Here are some tips in getting better results with using your flash.

Built-In Flash Unit Diffusers
Entry-level to semi-pro DSLRs have built-in pop up flashes on them. You can purchase a soft screen diffuser for these that attaches to the top of the camera. Most just cost less than $20.00.External Flash Unit Diffusers
Diffusers are also available for external flash units. Depending on how you intend to use it or your budget, you can get something as simple as Lumiquest's Ultrabounce which goes for about $14.95 or the Lumiquest MiniSoftbox for $19.95. For professional use, you can get Gary Fong's Lightsphere which does a great job of evenly spreading flash light.Other Tips for External Flash
The biggest advantage of using an external flash units like the Canon 580EX or the Nikon SB800 is the ability to aim the flash independent of the camera. By angling your flash head 45 degrees vertically, you can bounce the light for the ceiling which can also give it that diffused effect. You can even aim your flash to the side and use the walls to bounce off light.
If the ceiling is too high then you can use your flash's catchlight panel which acts as a mini reflector on your flash head.
If you rarely use your flash and can't justify the additional expense for the items mentioned then you can make do with items found in your home. You can wrap your flash head with tissue paper or wax paper to scatter the light. You can also make a home made bounce card by attaching a calling card to the top of your external flash head with a rubber band.

Tripod Heads 101

High quality tripods do not come with a tripod head. The reason behind this is that different tripod heads are designed for different applications.

Ball and Socket Heads
Ball and socket heads are the simplest and most compact tripod heads available. There's only one knob or lock that controls the full movement of the camera, giving you the ability to quickly frame your shots. There are, however, trade-offs for this simplicity. The first is that you cannot precisely pan your shots if your shooting a moving subject since once unlocked, the head is free to move both in the horizontal and vertical axes. You also need to re-orient your tripod if you want to take a portrait format shot so that the ball and socket head can slip into the groove along it's mounting base. Some models like the Giottos MH1000 have addressed these issues but they cost twice as much as your average ball and socket head.
Three-Way Heads
Three-way heads have independent locks for the horizontal and vertical movement as well as for tilting your camera between landscape and portrait orientation. The precision you get for these types of heads is unparalleled since you can just move the camera in a single direction while keeping everything else constant. This is specially helpful in panning shots most often used in sports photography. The biggest downside is that it can take you some time to re-orient your camera if the movement you want involves two or more of the locks to be adjusted.
Panoramic Heads
Most digital camera users make do with hand holding their camera when making panoramic shots. This is due to the fact that we can instantly see the previous shot taken on the LCD so we can just estimate the next frame in the panorama. The real strength of the panoramic head, aside from keeping frames perfectly aligned is that it takes into account the camera's focal plane. If the camera's movement is not aligned along it's focal plane when taking panoramic shots then you will get parallax problems specially if there are objects close to the camera.
Other Considerations

It is also advisable to purchase a spirit level if you want your photos to be perfectly aligned to the horizon. Even if you're using a tripod, you're never really sure if the ground it's set up on is completely flat. This is where a spirit level comes in. Most spirit levels can be attached to a camera's hot shoe and measure alignment both vertically and horizontally.

Also make sure that your tripod head matches the screw size of your tripod. The mounting screw on a tripod comes in two sizes, 1/4 inch and 3/8 inch. If you do not get the exact fit then you will need to purchase an adapter.

Back Up Your Work On the Road

If you plan out of town trips for the specific purpose of taking photos, or if you just take a ton of them whenever you go out, then you will definitely need to have some way of backing up your work. Here are some portable storage devices that have built in memory card slots.

Simple Devices
These types of storage have very simple LCDs (usually monochrome) that only show you the status of the transfer or how much space if left. Storage size range from 40GB to 60GB. Although you don't get much features, you save a lot on space since most of these can easily fit in the palm of your hand.

Multimedia Devices
These are the top of the line storage devices that feature full color large LCDs for reviewing your photos. Most have movie and MP3 playback capabilities and some like the Epson P-5000 can open RAW files. Usual storage size is about 60GB to 80 GB. These do not come cheap and most are almost in the price range of an entry level DSLR.


Portable CD/DVD Writers
These types are usually not preferred by professionals since you will still need to carry DVDs or CDs to back up your photos. This makes the whole thing of avoiding carrying a lot of memory cards seem redundant but having your files backed up on a DVD is still safer than just storing it in your flash card. Storage capability is of course dictated by your recording medium.Whichever portable solution you decide to buy, make sure that its battery life is long enough for your purpose and that it uses USB 2.0 so you can spend your day taking pictures instead of waiting for your photos to upload.

How to Take Care of Your Memory Cards

A lot of times, we forget how important our memory cards are and how much care they require. Here are some tips to remember when handling your digital film so you can avoid losing valuable data or getting error messages while you're on a shoot.

~ Always reformat you card right after you upload your photos to your PC.

~ Make sure your camera is off when you take out your card.

~ Never pull out your memory card while your camera is still reading or writing to it.

~ Never use up all the space on a memory card. Using up all the space can corrupt your entire card. Most DSLRs show how many shots are remaining on the LCD. Leave around 3 shots available.

~ Never share one memory card between two different cameras without reformatting it first.

~ Make sure that you have enough battery power when uploading your pictures. You can lose all the photos in your card if your battery dies while your card is reading or writing.

~ Keep your cards away from strong magnetic objects like your PC monitor.

~ Use a memory card wallet when going on shoots instead of keeping your cards in your pocket. Heat and moisture can permanently damage them. A quick tip on this, when you're using a card wallet and you need to change cards, just put in the used card with the label side down so you know that it's already been used.

Kinsgton Announces New CF Card Line-Up

Fountain Valley, CA - 10/29/07 - Kingston is beefing up their CompactFlash Elite Pro line up. The improvement was built with the serious photographer in mind by allowing 25MB/second (read) and 20MB/second (write), along with capacities up to 16GB. The whole line comes with a lifetime warranty.

The Elite Pro cards and their suggested retail prices (U.S. only):
2BG CompactFlash Elite Pro card $62.00
4GB CompactFlash Elite Pro card $77.00
8GB CompactFlash Elite Pro card $154.00
16GB Compact Flash Elite Pro card $308.00

You can read the press release here.

~Written by Jeff

Camera Straps 101

One of the things overlooked by most photographers who are just starting out is the camera strap. This is understandable since new cameras already have one included in the box. The problem is that these cloth straps were not made to feel you comfortable but rather to turn you into a walking advertisement. Not only do they not distribute weight properly on your neck, they also feel like crap once you start sweating. Showing your loyalty and undying affection to your camera maker might be fine for most people but the primary purpose of the camera strap should be comfort. Here are some suggestions if you value your neck's proper functioning.


Op/Tech Pro Strap

This strap is known for its excellent weight distribution. You can probably see from the picture that its biggest difference from your default strap is how wide the neck strap is. This part is made from neoprene which helps regulate temperature and it is specifically designed to put the load of your camera on your lower neck and shoulders.


Tamrac Neoprene Shock Absorber Strap

This is also made from neoprene which again helps with regulating heat, but what makes it different from the Op/Tech model is that the strap is noticeably thinner. Tamrac makes use of a stretchable neoprene material that evenly spreads your camera's weight on your neck. It also comes with a nifty CF card pouch so you wouldn't need to rummage for them in your pant pocket.


Lowepro Voyager C Camera Strap

This model is again made from neoprene and also has a CF card pouch. What makes this the best among the three, in my opinion, is that its neck strap is not as thick as that of Op/Tech's. Also, the Lowepro's anti-slip nylon webbing found under the neck part is better designed than Tamrac's Nylong ridges.


If you still feel the need to show your allegiance to your camera maker then you can opt to get a Domke pro strap that still has the Canon name on it. I haven't found an alternative for Nikon users though.

~Written by Jeff