Recently, Lensbaby announced a new creative focus lens for the iPhone, called the Sweet Spot Lens. Currently being crowdfunded via Kickstarter, the lens attaches directly to the iPhone’s camera and allows you to create unique images with a center spot that is in focus, and the surrounding areas disappearing into a maze of blur. Lensbaby has a long history of making creative focus lenses, but so far its product portfolio was limited to lenses for DSLRs and mirrorless cameras. With the Sweet Spot Lens, Lensbaby introduced its first such lens for a mobile device.
But, it seems Android users were feeling left out and complained to Lensbaby about it – enough so that Lensbaby announced it’s developing an Android version (Jelly 4.1-KitKat 4.4). Android users interested in a Sweet Spot Lens can pledge for one via the same Kickstarter page, but there are some catches.
First, you won’t benefit from any of the early-bird-backing offers. Instead, you’re going to have to pay a small premium for $5-10 over the two iPhone lens options, which makes for a total of $50. Then, while the iPhone lenses will already ship in July, Android users are going to have to wait until October for their Lensbaby experience. And finally, the accompanying app that’ll help you make the most of your mobile sweet spot lens is still under development for Android.
Despite all this, it’s great to see that Lensbaby embraces more than just the iPhone crowd. After all, Android is a very popular platform that makes up for the majority of smartphone sales. It may not be as popular as iOS with photographers, but that doesn’t mean it should be entirely neglected. After all, Lensbaby is only doing itself a favor by widening its potential client base.
Read more about the lens here.
