Juan's custom camera case

   
I made a custom camera case for Juan. Juan seemed happy with the finished product made to his specifications.  It is designed to be used with the case on. Lense cover and viewing front opens selectively. His right hand fits in the right side of camera case (stretches) to fully operate all buttons & dials.  It's also water resistant.
The strap is covered in cushy double layered neoprene. It is machine embroidered with Juan's name.  Embroidery already has a stabilizer backing, and was easy to sew.

It took almost 2 years, because I had to learn about sewing neoprene and had to test several snaps, reinforcement materials, and lots of ribbons and binding materials.  There were a LOT of trial and error!

It uses 3 mm neoprene, Pellon super heavy duty stabilizer (reinforce body), heavy duty snaps and regular sew-on snap for one-side (the original heavy-duty snap was too strong).  Button holes for strap connection were reinforced inside.  Button hole stitching had to be hand reinforced.  The machine will not feed properly on satin stitching due to stretching of neoprene.  All exposed edged were enclosed in ribbon or binding mostly by hand.

I am never making another project requiring intricate sewing using neoprene.  It's fine to make simple bag-type covers for a laptop or a iPhone using neoprene, because it is just one seam and does not have to accommodate differently shaped pieces and different stretch and stiff properties.