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Review: ExoLens' Wide-Angle Zeiss Lens is Bulky, but Takes Distortion-Free Photos
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A few comments sound like paid marketing. This thing is huge. The only real beneficial lens is the macro one, since the iPhone can't really do the whole macro thing yet.
Completely agree that this lens looks goofy AF on the iPhone, but overall photo quality is pretty amazing to the amateur photographer in me. Too bad I don't have $200 to shell out for one as this has certainly peaked my curiosity.
12mm Rokinon - it's fantastic. Manual, but fantastic and 18mm equivalent (1.5x crop). Plenty wide.
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No...can we stop with these sorts of comments? If what you mean is for a social media picture my picture seems clear like something from my buddy's DSLR then fine, I'll concede. The iPhone sensor is what, 1/3"? Great considering it fits in your pocket (unless you own an iPad Junior...err...I mean an iPhone Plus). With a piece of sapphire over it? There is a reason a good DSLR or mirrorless camera costs $1000+ for the body and lots more for good glass.
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The price of the A6000 and A6300 have only come down and both are fantastic.
ExoLens and Zeiss have teamed up to create some high-quality lenses designed to take iPhone photography to the next level. At $200, the ExoLens PRO with Optics by Zeiss Wide-Angle Kit for the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus is almost the price you'd pay for a standalone camera, but the lens is distortion free, compact, and enhances the range of images you can capture with your iPhone.
There are dozens of inexpensive lenses on the market, but most of the cheaper options are unable to measure up to the quality you get with the $199 Zeiss/ExoLens combo.
Design
The ExoLens PRO comes in a padded box and ships alongside several mounts to fit different sized iPhones, including the iPhone 7, iPhone 6s, and iPhone 6s Plus.
Right out of the package, the ExoLens PRO stands apart from other lens options. It's over an inch tall and similar in circumference to a standard pill bottle, with a solid weight to it. The outside of the lens is made from aluminum, and the glass of the lens itself is protected with caps on each side when not in use. Zeiss branding is on the side of the lens, which looks more like a small DSLR lens than a standard iPhone lens.
Inside the box, there are two carrying bags for the lens and any accessories, along with an aluminum lens hood and an installation guide.
Click here to read more...
Article Link: Review: ExoLens' Wide-Angle Zeiss Lens is Bulky, but Takes Distortion-Free Photos
Ha. Comes in a padded box and is an inch tall? Really? Did we learn this commentary in sales 101? What about actual photos? Do we have any samples to examine?
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It's misleading to say this is lens is distortion free. Not even the best lenses in the world claim that, especially wide-angle lenses. Lens distortion is not a check-box you tick either yes or no. There are different types and it varies from the centre point of an image. You simply cannot represent a spherical surface on a flat plane without some kind of compromise.
What the article probably means to say is that it has rectilinear correction (straight lines appear straight) and relatively low spherical distortion compared with other iPhone add-on lenses of its width. In other words, it's a premium version of this type of product. Even well rectilinear-corrected lenses still get volumetric distortion and perspective effects.
Saying "distortion-free" is market bollocks. It's misleading and incorrect and the author should clarify this for the benefit of readers who may not understand.
What the article probably means to say is that it has rectilinear correction (straight lines appear straight) and relatively low spherical distortion compared with other iPhone add-on lenses of its width. In other words, it's a premium version of this type of product. Even well rectilinear-corrected lenses still get volumetric distortion and perspective effects.
Saying "distortion-free" is market bollocks. It's misleading and incorrect and the author should clarify this for the benefit of readers who may not understand.
This a good point, and one that vexed me for several years as I was buying olloclip lenses and then having to buy new ones every year when I upgraded my phone. Eventually I stopped buying them.
Recently, olloclip changed their design so that the lenses are now technically separate from the plastic clip, so that when a new model of iPhone comes out, you can simply order a new cheap clip and pop your expensive lenses into it and voila!
Knowing that they are now going to last me much longer, I reinvested in a few different olloclip lenses and am pretty happy. I suppose if, for some reason, I was shooting a feature film on an iPhone, then I might want this impractical but optically stellar Zeiss lens. But in 99% of use cases, the Zeiss would be so clunky that it'd be impractical. The olloclip is so much smaller and more pocketable, it makes way more sense for walking around and doing "iPhone" photography.
Not sure why most folks are complaining. Buying this isn't mandatory. I chose Moment lens' over this one as I like the idea of only using my phone rather than an extra device. Plus I can edit stills and videos on my phone. A wide and a tele lens really come in handy, and the moment Ines are a fair bit cheaper but still decent quality.
It still fails to amaze me the stuff people plug on to these phones to try and make them something they're not. The best feature the iPhone can deliver to photography is serving as a viewing screen or remote for wi-fi enabled DSLRs/mirrorless. Otherwise they are VERY amateur cameras. Saw a guy at Disney World videoing the whole fireworks show with his full size iPad in the air blocking everyone else's view. As I looked at his screen and compared it to what I was seeing through a Sony A6300 and G zoom lens it was night and day...literally. That little tiny sensor couldn't a full moon in the desert. Now people are adding 1" deep of bulk to the back of their cameras? ...more to make fun of I guess. A decent (assuming it is) lens doesn't overcome a 1/3" sensor. Period. It's a great camera in broad daylight if it's the only thing on you but trying to make it closer to professional is a lost cause.
Joking aside and in all seriousness now:
What's the use case of this, really?
I myself am an amateur photographer and I take along my DSLR virtually all the time. Yes, it's not as practical as just taking your iPhone out of the pocket, but neither is handling this monstrosity.
And the picture quality and detail or control over the picture of seriously ANY cheap DSLR blows ANY phone's camera literally out of the water, even with crappy kit zooms.
There have only been a few cases using "real" cameras, where the camera's sensor was actually the limiting factor for me, rather than a decent lens or my photographic skills (or rather lack of them). But with the iPhone - Zeiss - combination, the pinhead-sized sensor of the iPhone would definitely be holding me back, even I am just an amateur/hobbyist.
So if this "thing" is limiting, even for an amateur photographer, it's fair to assume it's absolutely useless for a professional. And "general folk" as you put it, would probably (I think) not give a damn about a 200$ - strap-on.
So not to be mean or bashy, maybe I overlooked something, but really: WHO is target audience of this?
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You're describing a telephoto lens, not a wide angle lens, which is the subject of this article. To achieve the same effects as a WA by foot you'd have to move farther away and that's often not possible. And the lens changes perspective entirely.
Still don't think it's worth it
but I understand now, from a photographer standpoint why it allows for a perspective that normally wouldn't be possible alone.There is a simple explanation for it. SLR prices were going down because non professional customers were buying a lot more of them. As phone cameras have become better and better, people are not buying enough SLRs because it's convenient to just whip out your iPhone for most casual photography. Point and shoot is almost completely dead.
I still love my DSLR and let my wife take charge of the casual photography. I hope I don't get tired of lugging my DSLR kit bag on trips. I hope customers keep buying these cameras to keep the prices lower but they will still be higher than 5 years ago.
Bad product, expensive and bulky, alters whatever role the camera module on an iphone stands for: simplicity and portability. It will never be able to take decent pictures because of the iphone's small sensor that creates noise and I don't believe that this lens can take distortion free images. Furthermore, the extra weight and the already bad and unstable holding of the iphone itself will make things even worse. Needless to say there is no resemblance to a real camera.
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"these" take really high end dreams. not photos. Real high end photos you take with Leicas and/or proffesional dSLRs. Photos that you take with an iphone -no matter what lens you attach on them- are a joke
IMHO there is a huge potential market for these (and telephotos), but what's holding everything up is that every year phones change physically so old lenses no longer fit. The Canon Nikon razor razorblade model works because lens connections remain standardised for at least 10 or 15 years. Even with this model cited half of the new iPhone's imaging system is disabled.
So companies should be producing 1) phone lenses and 2) new phone adapters for those lenses every year. Instead we get lens + adapter all in one, which becomes obsolete after one year. Or multitude of adapters but they only work with standalone equipment such as scope or microscope, where the lenses are over-specced for phone use, not with a purpose built lens system.
TLDR separate the lens system from the adapters!
I would add that phones definitely have good enough imaging chips to take even professional photos now. Easily good enough for half of what you see in newspapers and magazines. And getting better every year. What they are lacking though is a lens (and lighting) system.
So companies should be producing 1) phone lenses and 2) new phone adapters for those lenses every year. Instead we get lens + adapter all in one, which becomes obsolete after one year. Or multitude of adapters but they only work with standalone equipment such as scope or microscope, where the lenses are over-specced for phone use, not with a purpose built lens system.
TLDR separate the lens system from the adapters!
I would add that phones definitely have good enough imaging chips to take even professional photos now. Easily good enough for half of what you see in newspapers and magazines. And getting better every year. What they are lacking though is a lens (and lighting) system.
Someone mentioned real estate people, that's possible. Those instagramers that do it for money?
I actually don't know! Enough for them to make multiple versions of these over the years!
These people wont even bother to look for an addon lens to take photos. Most of them done even know how to take photos. For these people the phone camera is more than enough. A phone is a phone, cameras were added as a convenience and were never a main function. It's as taking your car keys and adding a camera, thats how silly it looks like. Or like taking a hammer and adding a camera.
Plus, you won't be able to afford a cheap mirrorless to go along with your iphone 8.
My take on this -- and I've worked with cameras and with pro photographers for many years -- is that it's a probably a nice optical enhancement to your phone camera, but unless compactness is everything, one might get more "bang for the buck" by putting that money toward buying a separate camera. Highly recommend dpreview.com for buying advice.
The iPhone 7 comes with a "28mm equivalent lens"-- mildly wide angle. According to the product literature, this Zeiss ad on lens reduces that to "18mm equivalent".
Now, if one purchases a APS-C camera (alpha a6500, say) it will sometimes come with a 16-50mm lens kit...
16mm is wider angle than "18mm equivalent" isn't it?
Not so fast. Because the Sony a6500 uses a APS-C sensor, its 35mm equivalent will be 24mm. To get the equivalent field of view, one would probably want to pick up a 12 mm lens. (or a ultrawide zoom)
Or go full frame, and leave this equivalence nonsense behind.
Now, if one purchases a APS-C camera (alpha a6500, say) it will sometimes come with a 16-50mm lens kit...
16mm is wider angle than "18mm equivalent" isn't it?
Not so fast. Because the Sony a6500 uses a APS-C sensor, its 35mm equivalent will be 24mm. To get the equivalent field of view, one would probably want to pick up a 12 mm lens. (or a ultrawide zoom)
Or go full frame, and leave this equivalence nonsense behind.
Uh......brosef somebody must inform you but 18mm is significantly wider than 28mm. That is deep in the ultra-wide-angle territory
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Uh...what is nonsensical about it?
Nobody can recite cell phone camera sensor dimensions. Angle of view would make sense except it was never popularly used as lingua franca of camera terminology.
People relate to 35mm-format description so proving a 35mm-equivalent is relatable and intuitive.
I don't know who it's targeted too but it's not Realtors. The successful ones have a photo service take pictures, and often create a VR video with them. Good Realtors understand their business is selling homes, not taking pictures -- they leave that to those who do that for a living.
As the first paragraph of this article says, for $200 you could buy a better point and shoot camera if you really needed wide angle ability. Carry this accessory around, carry another camera around you are still carrying something extra around. A P&S offers more versatility and less clumsiness of having to removing the accessory. I hardly see this as a no-brainer. Seems extremely niche to me. I see a lot better ways to skin the wide angle cat than this.
Not around here. Realtors know their market and there's a big difference between making 3% on a million dollar sale and 3% on a $200,000 sale. In a market like this, the range of selling prices is generally so narrow you'd never recoup the cost of a professional photographer; to make a living, you make staging the house the owner's responsibility and do as much work you can within your own agency.