felipe
Established
Since some folks were asking, here's a small review of the safrotto bags we bought:
THE BAD:
The sewing job in some places looks amateurish at best and the yarn/thread used is kinda low quality. There are occasional thread "heaps" which I suppose are a result of equally low quality sewing machines 😀 (the needles don't go trough wholy then and if they don't break AND you are in a hurry you don't notice ..)
The inserts fabric is glossy nylon, which I dislike, but I am spoiled by the gorgeous Billingham inserts (which BTW. fits the 700 like it's been made for it!)
The buckles are dirt-cheap and I gaffer taped mine to get some more life from my fingers. Of course I made the painful experience BEFORE I taped it. 😉
Having said that, the sewing and even the fabric is about the same quality as lowepros, maybe they even share the same factory, I strongly guess so.
It is nowhere near Billingham/Heritage, but it is definetly better than the domkes I have seen and is close to the old tenba canvas/corduroy bags.
THE REST:
I can open it with one hand in some seconds (well, after I taped the buckle closure), it is very! comfortable to carry, the shoulder pad is padded well, and it doen't really look anything like a camera bag.
Also, it's very quiet to open and easy to work out of. (I confirmed this taking pictures of snow, kneedeep in snow, during a snow"storm" at -14 C + windchill - could still open to bag with frozen fingers, gloves on 🙂)I suppose staying at home would have been sufficient.
On a sidenote, I took off one of the Safrotto labels and overpainted the other one with a textile marker - mainly because I had too much time on my hands on my birthday🙂
Don't do this if you don't feel comfortable with a sewing needle/machine! They apparently hide all their lack of sewing knowledge under those labels. 😀
Also, if you want to do it, the labels and stitching goes all the way to the edges which are additionally set in, so first you cut through the stitching you can actually see, then cut away as much as possible from the label and then carefully use something like a hook to pull out the rest of it from beneath the set-in. Don't try to pull out the stitching with brute force as this will destroy the canvas.
so here are some pics of what I carried arround today, there is still plenty of room left though...
THE BAD:
The sewing job in some places looks amateurish at best and the yarn/thread used is kinda low quality. There are occasional thread "heaps" which I suppose are a result of equally low quality sewing machines 😀 (the needles don't go trough wholy then and if they don't break AND you are in a hurry you don't notice ..)
The inserts fabric is glossy nylon, which I dislike, but I am spoiled by the gorgeous Billingham inserts (which BTW. fits the 700 like it's been made for it!)
The buckles are dirt-cheap and I gaffer taped mine to get some more life from my fingers. Of course I made the painful experience BEFORE I taped it. 😉
Having said that, the sewing and even the fabric is about the same quality as lowepros, maybe they even share the same factory, I strongly guess so.
It is nowhere near Billingham/Heritage, but it is definetly better than the domkes I have seen and is close to the old tenba canvas/corduroy bags.
THE REST:
I can open it with one hand in some seconds (well, after I taped the buckle closure), it is very! comfortable to carry, the shoulder pad is padded well, and it doen't really look anything like a camera bag.
Also, it's very quiet to open and easy to work out of. (I confirmed this taking pictures of snow, kneedeep in snow, during a snow"storm" at -14 C + windchill - could still open to bag with frozen fingers, gloves on 🙂)I suppose staying at home would have been sufficient.
On a sidenote, I took off one of the Safrotto labels and overpainted the other one with a textile marker - mainly because I had too much time on my hands on my birthday🙂
Don't do this if you don't feel comfortable with a sewing needle/machine! They apparently hide all their lack of sewing knowledge under those labels. 😀
Also, if you want to do it, the labels and stitching goes all the way to the edges which are additionally set in, so first you cut through the stitching you can actually see, then cut away as much as possible from the label and then carefully use something like a hook to pull out the rest of it from beneath the set-in. Don't try to pull out the stitching with brute force as this will destroy the canvas.
so here are some pics of what I carried arround today, there is still plenty of room left though...
