Do you ever find that your phone’s portrait mode blurs out parts of your subject that you actually wanted in focus?
Do you want to capture a blurred background in videos like you can in the new iPhone 13s without upgrading your phone?
A smartphone telephoto lens like the BeastGrip Pro Series Tele Lens will help with both.
BeastGrip Pro Series 2x Tele Conversion Lens Unboxing
Let’s unbox and talk about what comes with your purchase of this Pro Series Lens from BeastGrip before we talk about what the lens can do for you.
The box includes:
- the lens with a built-in 58mm lens filter mount
- a carrying pouch
- a microfiber cleaning cloth
- both front and back lens caps
Perhaps my favorite thing about this lens is the front lens cap – it reminds me of one you’d get for a traditional camera! While this is a totally meaningless fact, I do appreciate these little touches.
Now, to use the lens you will need to make an additional purchase of the BeastGrip Pro or BeastCage, and both of these options are fairly expensive. It’s worth noting, though, that I have the BeastCage and absolutely love it. The BeastCage comes with mounting options for Pro Series, M-Series, Moment, Sandmarc, and traditional camera lenses. It also has 15+ ¼’ mounting options which allow you to construct whatever rig you can imagine. The BeastGrip Pro is a universal version of the iPhone-only BeastCage.
Want to learn more about the BeastCage? Check out this video.
What Does The BeastGrip Pro Series Tele Lens Do?
Now that we’re through with that boring stuff, let’s talk about what the BeastGrip Pro Series Tele Lens actually does.
Tele or telephoto lenses create a hardware-produced bokeh and a compressed depth of field. This is a fancy way of saying that the lens provides a blurred background while making said background appear closer to the subject.
To show you these ideas in action, comparison shots for both the bokeh and the compressed depth of field.
To show hardware-induced versus software-induced bokeh, I took identical photos for each (see images above). I used the native camera app’s Portrait mode on my iPhone 11 Pro for the software bokeh and the BeastGrip 2x Tele Lens in the BeastCam Pro Camera App for the hardware induced one. What’s BeastCam? BeastCam is BeastGrip’s app that allows manual control for both photos and videos.
Now for the compressed depth of field. In the image comparison slider below, which photo looks to have the trees in the background closer to the subject? The image on the right, correct? The reason for this is that the BeastGrip Pro Series 2x Tele Lens compresses the image and makes the background appear closer, which helps make the subject of your photos or videos stand out.
What Should You Use the BeastGrip Pro Series Telephoto Lens For?
The other day my brother asked me to take some headshots for him for work, and I figured it was an ideal opportunity to test the BeastGrip Pro Series Telephoto Lens in action.
This tele lens creates an intimate look that highlights the subject. It’s ideal for taking photos and/or videos of people or animals because of the compressed depth of field and beautifully natural bokeh. If you like taking portraits on your iPhone, then you should be considering this lens.
The big question that you should have is, how does this lens compare to the BeastGrip M-Series Tele? Fortunately for you, we bought both the M-Series and Pro-Series lenses to compare in a future video.
Is the BeastGrip Pro Series Tele Lens Worth It?
The BeastGrip Pro Series Tele Lens is more expensive than other mobile telephoto lenses, but it’s clearly a high-quality piece of gear that actually works. If you’re a beginner to smartphone photography, then perhaps it would behoove you to go in a less expensive direction because buying this lens mean also having to buy a costly mounting option. There will be a similar post and accompanying video about the BeastGrip M-Series Tele Lens coming soon. If you aren’t sold on the Pro Series Tele, then be sure to stay tuned for more about the M-Series one.
Intrigued by BeastGrip? Learn more about BeastGrip here.
