The Low Down
- What it is: 2 Wide angle lenses
- Price: $49.99
- Where to buy: Directly From Lime Lens
The Get Down
For most of us, our phone is always with us, always within arm’s reach. We use it for everything from surfing the web, checking our email, looking at our bank accounts and even phone calls. It is also the easiest to get to and sometimes the best camera we have around too.
I have longed for a camera on my phone that could replace a standard bulky digital camera. And the Galaxy S7 Edge is as close to that as I have found. It takes beautiful photos in the right light and pretty good ones in low light too. But what it lacks is a wide angle shot that can catch those big family photos or wide open spaces in nature.
The pictures below were taken standing in the same position at the same height.
Taken with no Lens attached
Taken with The Thinker
Taken with The Captain
Enter Lime Lens. Maybe. The set includes both The Thinker – Dual Macro / Wide Lens and The Captain – Supreme Fisheye Lens. Both lenses dramatically change the standard photos you get with the built-in camera.
Let’s start at the beginning. After opening the package I found that the lenses were packed quite well. It seems professional and everything is protected well in the case. You will get both lenses, 3 “clips” (these are how you mount the lens to your phone) cleaning cloth, #LimeLife stickers, and an instruction manual, plus the faux leather zipper case is all comes in.
Lime Lens Case opened
Lime Lens Case Half opened
The first thing we have to do is determine which clip goes to our phone. There is a great guide in the manual so we won’t go into that here. Once you have the clip installed it’s time to put those lenses on and start shooting.
The Down Low
The lenses are small, as you would expect since they are for your phone. But I found it hard not to touch the glass parts of them and had fingerprints I had to wipe away. Luckily Lime Lens supplied the cleaning cloths.
There is a ridge in the clip and a piece that goes into that on half of each lens, so you put the lens in the clip and twist it half way around to lock it into place. I found this to be tricky and actually dropped the lenses a couple of times when I thought they were secure. It did not break and seemed to take each fall well.
Now let talk about that clip. This is my least favorite part of Lime Lens. The clip is a piece of plastic that sticks to your phone. Once removed from your phone it cannot be used again. It will not work if you have a case on your phone since the lens has to be right on top of the lens on the phone’s camera. There is a list of cases that will work with Lime Lens but most are not very perspective.
Center View
From the Top
At the Bottom
For a product that is not used all the time I am frustrated that I have to have a part of it stuck to my phone all the time, and it stops me from putting the case back on my phone since I can’t take it off when not in use. There are a few other products on the market (none of which I have used so I don’t know if the lenses work as well as the Lime Lens) that have solved this problem by actually being a clip that can be removed when the lens is not in use.
They definitely don’t look as good as Lime Lens when you are actually using the lenses, but for me I would prefer my phone to look funny when I need to use the lens and then take it off when it’s not in use, than to have a piece of plastic stuck to the back of my phone all the time.
The lenses themselves work well and really add something useful to your phone’s camera. You can see in the pictures above how much more you can get in the shot with the Wide angle lens.
So if you don’t use a case or are willing to buy a new one that works with the lime lens clip, and you need to take wide angle shots with your phone this might be the product for you.