Even though smartphones have gotten good enough to compete with DSLR or mirrorless cameras in certain everyday scenarios, they still have one big disadvantage: fixed focal lengths. Despite smartphones now occasionally sporting two lenses, they don’t quite have the flexibility of a real interchangeable lens camera.
That’s where accessories like Moment’s smartphone lenses come in. The company today announced it’s bringing its add-on glass and cases (which serve as lens mounts) to the iPhone X.
Moment currently makes four compatible optics that cost $90 or $100: A wide angle, a 2x telephoto, a fish-eye, and a macro lens. These are attached to your shiny new iPhone X with either a regular rubberized case or a battery case, both of which support wrist straps.
I’ve been trying some of Moment’s lenses on the Pixel 2 for the last couple of weeks and so far, so good. Where many smartphone lenses can be too blurry to use regularly or introduce annoying aberrations, the wide-angle and fish-eye lenses I’ve tried are sharp enough to be comparable with the standard camera – except, of course, with a wider field of view.
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That said, the iPhone X’s implementation isn’t quite as exciting as the Google Pixels, as the dual-camera system means you can’t use portrait mode with a lens attached. But if you don’t always need super-blurred backgrounds, Moment’s lenses could greatly increase the flexibility of the iPhone X’s camera while keeping it a bit safer from drops too.
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