One trick with heavy lenses- if you know you'll be carrying a heavy lens for a long time, reverse the camera and the strap and strap it like you're carrying a messenger bag. As Irischrome said, if your lens is heavy, it'll pull away from your body. If you reverse it so that your lens is parallel to your body, your lens and body are perpendicular to ground, there's no torque on the mount. The only downside is that you're kit isn't "ready", you'll have to readjust your camera strap, but if you know you'll be walking around for quite a bit, it's not a bad way to carry your camera. It's also good in a tight situation, you'll keep your lens from getting knocked around.

@mikenothing

There really isn't any agreed upon method for carrying heavy lenses and probably the more you search the more you'll find people will be divided. As for me I prefer to let the lens dangle down and let it pull down on the camera than for it to stick straight out. This is simply because if the lens is sticking out then you'd have an effect on the mount similar to when you try to dislodge, say, a boulder with a stick. You only need to apply a small force on the edge of the stick for it to translate as a big force at the boulder. So in the lens-camera system, the weight of the lens will transfer through the mount but since the part of the lens that sticks in the camera is so short, the force transfered will be much higher than the lens' weight. Where if you let the lens dangle down, the force being applied on the mount is just the weight of the lens.

As far as carrying my camera around, especially with longer or heavier lenses, I usually like to wrap the camera strap around my hand as to form a grip . This is not to be confused with Joe McNally's "Da Grip" (nice video btw NSX) but like one of those leather grips they sell for DSLR's. Try it that way and see how you like it.

i searched around a lot, and there doesnt seem to be a consensus ....

i didnt necessarily mean while shooting, i meant like when carrying it around by the strap.

say, i just hold it by the handgrip while walking around, is it going to cause damage ? or if i hang the camera from the strap over my shoulder, with the lens attached, while walking, is it going to damage itself, or is it safe ?

anyone out there had problems ?

elvishefer said:
I felt the same way until I got the 24-70 f/2.8...

Yes that is the normal resident on my D700, and I agree that it's at the limit of what I feel comfortable with hanging from the camera. Strangely enough though, I think I'm equally concerned about whether the strap/lugs can take the weight, as damaging the mount.

Here's a good video- slightly long though with Joe McNally.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDsx3-FWfwk

Monopods are quite useful for quick setup and shoot situations. Maybe even look into a hand strap unit which attaches to a tripod shoe piece on the camaera base if the shoulder strap is not working for you? Again common sense should prevail here as Adam mentioned. Nikon is very heavy I agree the D700+24-70mm even wears on you after several hours...

if you're shooting even with a 24-70, you should be cupping the lens with your left hand, the body with your right hand, and your left shoulder (that's appropriate technique)...

What body do you have? If you have a D3000, D3100, D40, D60... Anything smaller than a D70/D80/D90/D7000 definitely hold it by the lens. With the D70/D80/D90/D7000 you will be fine holding it by the body but using a grip will help balance it much easier.
anything D300(s)/D200/D100 and higher either body or lens will work fine as it balances well... Now with the 300mm f/2.8 I always hold it by the lens...

http://www.nikonusa.com/Learn-And-Explore/Photography-Techniques/g699vchg/1/Getting-Started-How-to-Hold-Your-Camera.html

SkintBrit said:
Personaly I always use whether the LENS has a tripod mount to guide me as to what I should support. Seems logical?

I felt the same way until I got the 24-70 f/2.8...

Yeah, I'm slightly worried about the D40 and the 105mm macro. But when I use that combination, I'm mostly just holding the lens, I'm not really holding the body anymore.

Search the internet for proper holding techniques. That will answer your question and improve you shooting as well.

Personaly I always use whether the LENS has a tripod mount to guide me as to what I should support. Seems logical?

Balance point: left hand under the lens cradling it at the balance point and right hand on the camera when shooting. This is the classic camera holding and shooting position. Put camera with lens attached in a shoulder bag case when carrying around and not shooting.

although You my think 70-200 is a heavy setup it's not. starting from 200/2 You should start worry about how to handle the whole setup. IMHO, don't worry too much and use your common sense.

this might be a silly question, but its my first heavy lens (70-200), and im unsure ....

i have been reading around a lot of forums, and there seems to be mixed messages going around as to how to hold a heavier setup. people seem to be in two different camps :

"cameras are tougher than you think, dont worry about it, i have done it for years and no problem"

"it will warp the mount over time, always support the lens"

can you dangle the camera from a strap like you would with a smaller lens? or will it cause problems? can you hold the camera's handgrip with a heavy lens attached ?