Originally posted by MRRiley
Am I the only one who hates the camera strap lugs?
The way they are designed the camera wants to hang flat and this works fine with short or light weight lenses. However, with longer lenses or ones which weigh substantually more than the body, the strap gets twisted downward awkwardly and it gets pretty uncomfortable.
I'd like to see Pentax restore the old style lugs that use the triangular rings and perhaps move the one on the grip side down a tad to allow for better balance.
I don't like the strap lug arrangements but for a different reason.
When I'm actively using my camera it is either on the tripod or in both my hands, and when I'm not actively using it it goes right into the bag. So the comfort of the neck strap is not an issue, and I have no use for wrist straps or some sort of video cam hand strap gizmo. But I do use the neck strap lightly draped around the back of my neck when the camera is in my hands to prevent an accidental fall, and as a third hand while changing lenses out of the bag. I can then devote both hands to handling the lenses and lens caps and avoid an unpleasant accident.
On my Pentax LX, there are three lug mounting points. You can use the mounts on the top left and right for conventional strap mounting. Or you can put a grip on the right side (from the user's perspective) and put the lugs on the left top and bottom of the camera. This way the camera hangs vertically instead of horizontally. IMHO, this gives a much more convenient angle for mounting and dismounting lenses (since I can easily cradle the camera body in my right hand and rotate it without the straps interfering). When using the camera, both straps conveniently fall below the left forearm completely out of the way. And this strap mounting corrects your imbalance issue with a long lens, since the camera balances much better on the long axis and there is enough length on the right side of the camera body to balance the lens weight against your chest and stomach. The "vertical" strap arrangement was also used on the Leica M5 (and probably other cameras).
Unfortunately, I seem to be in a small minority in liking this arrangement since Leica was compelled to add a third lug on the M5, and no Pentax SLR since the LX has had the option for the "vertical" strap mount. But I would love to see the LX strap mounting system adopted on a Pentax DSLR. And, for the video cam hand strap crowd, Pentax could add a fourth lug mounting point on the bottom right, permitting the use of the hand strap without interfering with the tripod mount or battery compartment.