About a month and a half ago, I received the opportunity to get my hands on a pre-production version of the new SpiderPro Hand Strap from Spider Holster. I had been on the lookout for a good hand strap and I was convinced that this would be a great option. I was very excited to give it a try.

spiderholster-handstrap

Unfortunately, the strap did not work well with my mirrorless kit. So I was actually not able to get much use out of the strap, but being as I work part time at a camera store, I did borrow a Canon DSLR to give the strap a shot, and I was very impressed.

[RELATED: My Review of the Spider Holster Black Widow]

My Thoughts On The SpiderPro Hand Strap

First off, I wanted to talk a bit about the construction and build of this strap. It feels great on your hand; it has just enough padding to be comfortable, but not so much as to feel mushy. Everything from the leather to the stitching on the unit is absolutely top notch – no faults with the construction of this hand strap whatsoever.

Spider Pro Hand Strap

Attaching the SpiderPro Hand Strap to your camera is simple enough. I had zero issues getting the strap attached to any of the cameras that I tried putting it on. It does come with some easy instructions on how to properly put the strap on the camera, for those of you who like to read those sort of things.

image007

Once the grip is attached to your camera and you slide your hand inside for the very first time, you will love how it feels. Unlike other straps that I have tried, the SpiderPro Hand Strap fits the shape of my hand well, and is very comfortable. If it doesn’t feel quite right, the design of the strap makes it super easy to adjust to better fit your needs.

My camera felt secure, and I felt comfortable with this strap while walking about on trails and such during my photo walks. Overall, if you own a DSLR, I can’t recommend this hand strap enough. If you own a mirrorless or smaller camera body though, you may want to look elsewhere.

20150320-_DSC0031

A major positive for this strap is the ability to mount it using the included washer and bolt, or under ANY tripod plate, allowing you to use this strap in conjunction with any tripod your heart desires. I absolutely loved this aspect of the SpiderPro Hand Strap.

The SpiderPro Hand Strap is designed for DSLR bodies, and not just DSLR bodies – Pro DSLR bodies. It does its job really well on cameras of that size, but if you try it on a smaller body such as a Fuji X-T1 or even a small DSLR like a Rebel, you will find that it no longer holds your hand in the correct place, making it very uncomfortable to shoot with. You may feel differently, but with my hands, it really only fit well on full sized DSLRs (7D, 5D, etc)

This is not a knock against the strap as it’s designed for DSLR bodies, and it does its job well on them. It’s just a warning to those of you who, like me, are looking for a good strap for your mirrorless body. Keep looking.

That said, if I owned a DSLR, I would be all over this strap. It is very affordable, coming in at $65 for the basic black version or $75 for a color version. For that reason, I am comfortable giving the SpiderPro Hand Strap a solid 4 our of 5 stars, and recommending it for DSLR owners.

32-overall-score-4-stars

 

The only thing holding it back in my opinion is the inability to use it on more than just Pro DSLR bodies. If they can come out with another version that works better with cameras of different sizes, surely that would be worthy of a full 5 out of 5 stars.

For more information, you can find all the details about the Spider Pro hand strap over on the Spider Holster Website here.