Xtrahand Vests

**Ed Richards** · 7-Feb-2007, 17:26

Any one have experience with these? They are parachute nylon, which sounds like a better bet for tropical wear.

http://www.vestedinterest.com/

**Ted Harris** · 7-Feb-2007, 18:10

Why not just go to Cabela's and buy one of thier many choices for 40 to 100 bucks?

**Frank Petronio** · 7-Feb-2007, 18:16

Geez they look hot no matter the material.

And I don't mean hot like Paris Hilton.

Come to think of it, being hot sounds good to me now that it is Zero outside.

**David A. Goldfarb** · 7-Feb-2007, 18:19

Nature shooters seem to like the LL Rue vest (which is out of stock at the moment, but looks to be a nice thing, if one is in the market for a vest)--

http://www.rue.com/vest.html

**Robert Oliver** · 7-Feb-2007, 18:38

Originally Posted by Ted Harris

Why not just go to Cabela's and buy one of thier many choices for 40 to 100 bucks?

you've obviously never had the pleasure of wearing an overloaded cotton photo vest saturated by your own sweat for an entire day in the blazing tropical humidity.

I have in my former professional photographer life... not fun

interesting concept with silk, but there is still something really painful about a photo vest over loaded with gear digging into the C-spine. I gravitated to the waste belt, modular bag system made by the likes of Lowe Pro or Kinesis.

**Robert Oliver** · 7-Feb-2007, 18:40

as far as vests go, that one seems pretty neat. I like they way they made it out of mesh and reworked the part of the vest that usually digs into your lower cervical spine. As far as vests go, it seems like a pretty good design.

**naturephoto1** · 7-Feb-2007, 18:40

Originally Posted by David A. Goldfarb

Nature shooters seem to like the LL Rue vest (which is out of stock at the moment, but looks to be a nice thing, if one is in the market for a vest)--

http://www.rue.com/vest.html

Hi David,

I have one of the Rue vests. I believe that Rue has been out of these vests for some time.

Rich

**Ted Harris** · 7-Feb-2007, 18:48

Robert ... I have but Cabela's has them with mesh backs. Generally when it is that hot I wear shirts with lots of pockets and to hell with vests

**Frank Petronio** · 7-Feb-2007, 19:39

My wife wants to get me one of these to wear for when I shoot pretty girls. She figures it is a good sex prevention device. I think suicide bombers like the look too -- seriously I think I'd worry about getting shot by some trigger happy guard if I wore one in NYC or near some TSA protected area.

Besides, those pictures of the overloaded vests on that website just look painful to me. I can see a small pack or pocket with some film holders and little things like loupes, but to carry view lenses and Polaroids it just seems too macho.

Those Gnass Geear film holder cases are really nice for tripod shots -- they are quick to stow into a daypack. For handheld 4x5 press shooting I would look towards the man-purses or courier bags you carry on your shoulder -- versatile enough and then you can switch sides and distribute the load through out the day (8# Technika on one side, 8# of holders and gadgets on the opposite side.)

**David A. Goldfarb** · 7-Feb-2007, 19:57

Surprising to see the Rue vests going out of production, since they've been such a standard item for such a long time. One of the attractions of such a thing is that you can load it up and get it on a plane without it being classified as "baggage," and then load it more reasonable for field use.