For about a decade now I’ve watched people walk around with digital cameras strapped to their necks, and it’s been an uninspiring image: the stale, black camera strap either yawns alone or shouts out “CANON EOS” or “NIKON” expletives, as if we had any say in the matter. Insipid digital cameras!
This past year I’ve had a mission on my agenda: to find a vintage camera strap like the one my father used to hang his Yashika 35mm from. I figured it would be an easy task, but the lack of product out there on the resale market left me wandering around looking for something new? Some kind of replica? Why was I the only person looking for something like this? Why was everyone so complacent with the black camera strap advertisement? I mean, this is a basic accessory! Like a pair of good shoes, you’re going to wear this thing every day.
About a month ago I found this “vintage” tapestry camera strap from B&H camera, and ordered it. About a week later it arrived, but guess what? It was BLACK. I think I started to twitch. “Excuse me,” I started in on customer service, “but WTF?!”
Turns out, B&H staff has to pick, at random, whatever color strap comes out of a big box of assorted camera straps. You can’t request any particular color or pattern; you get what you get and you then throw a fit.
Enter a savvy businessperson with an eye for what’s NEEDED in the world of photography fashion: Souldier Straps. DUH. Thank you. Based in Chicago, these women buy out a warehouse of vintage rickrack and trim and then spin their gold in the form of guitar straps, camera straps and belts. And then they go the next step and hit the music festivals.
A couple of weekends ago, Damon & I were at the Austin City Limits Music Festival, half-drunk and sweating our boots off, and when we cooled off under the market tents, we discovered these way-cool straps and treated each other to our 2008 souvenirs. I bought him a floral guitar strap; he bought me this beautiful turquoise and gold camera strap. It only took us about an entire concert slot to decide on the final patterns. But man, was it totally worth it.