Moment 1.55x Anamorphic Lens for Smartphones with Golden Streak/Flare Announced

Smartphone Filmmaking

by Jakub HanFebruary 14^th, 2023

Moment 1.55x anamorphic M-series lens for smartphones provides a larger squeeze factor resulting in 2.76:1 aspect ratio footage with prominent gold streaks and flares with barrel distortion. Via the Moment M-series phone cases or the universal M-series lens mount, the lens is compatible with almost any smartphone. Pre-orders have started for $119.99 with shipping in late March.

Moment is a US-based company specializing in designing phone & camera accessories. They mostly caught my attention with the series of phone lenses that have been on the market for a while now. The company ventures in the field of camera accessories every now and then – last year, for instance, Moment launched the 1.33x anamorphic adapter on Kickstarter. Talking about anamorphic, after having a 1.33x squeeze smartphone lens in the portfolio for a while, Moment recently launched a new 1.55x anamorphic lens for smartphones. Let’s take a look at the details.

Phones and anamorphic lens adapters

I think I don’t need to emphasize, how more and more filmmakers are relying on their phones as A, B, C, or D cameras. Smartphones have gotten so much better at shooting video in the last few years, that I do not dare imagine where they will be in five or ten years from now.

Anyway, accessories such as an anamorphic lens (or some sort of diffusion filter) actually tremendously help smartphone footage to look less sharp, and in a way – less digital. Also, technically, these are not lenses, because the phone’s cameras already have lenses. I think lens adapter is more accurate in this case. However, Moment is not the first company to introduce a 1.55x anamorphic lens for smartphones – there are already similar products from SmallRig, Sandmarc and Beastgrip, to only name a few.

Moment 1.55x anamorphic lens for smartphones

Moment claims, the design of this lens was inspired by the 1.5x Iscorama 54 anamorphic adapter. The Moment lens adapter is made out of metal and hand-polished glass used for larger lenses. Of course, the new one provides more squeeze as opposed to the existing 1.33x anamorphic adapter. Because smartphones film in a 16:9 aspect ratio, the resulting footage will have a 2.76:1 aspect ratio.

The optical characteristics of the anamorphic lens adapter introduce a prominent barrel-type distortion. Thanks to the anti-reflection coatings, the lens creates vintage horizontal gold flares. The lens is unidirectional so the mount can be rotated 90° depending on a mobile device. The weight of the Moment 1.55x anamorphic lens is 37.6g and its dimensions are 21.85×33.25×30.25mm.

The lens attaches with a simple twist-and-lock system to any Moment M-Series phone case. Moment offers the M-series phone cases for many phone models including Apple iPhone, Google Pixel, Samsung Galaxy and others. If you happen to have a phone that is not supported and does not have an M-series phone case, you can still attach the lens using the universal M-series lens mount.

In the case of the latest iPhones, the case still allows you to use the iPhone’s MagSafe to attach accessories. The lens itself is also compatible with Moment’s 67mm filter adapter, so you can still attach an ND filter in front of the anamorphic lens when shooting in bright daylight.

The Moment 1.55x anamorphic lens produces gold flare and currently, there is no other version. Since the 1.33x lens exists in both gold and blue flare versions, we might see the 1.55x blue flare version come in the future, but so far Moment has not announced it.

Thankfully, the Moment Pro camera app already includes settings for de-squeezing the footage in the phone so it is ready to share or work with. I believe some other pro camera apps such as FiLMIC Pro also include an option to de-squeeze footage (at least for monitoring).

Price and availability

According to the Moment website, the 1.55x M-series anamorphic lens will retail for $149.99, but for a limited time, you can now pre-order it for $119.99. The shipping should start in late March 2023. Do not forget that you will need the M-series case from Moment with the mount to attach the lens to a compatible smartphone. For the iPhone 14, you will also need a drop-in lens mount to attach the lens.

Do you include smartphone footage in your projects? Have you tried any of the anamorphic lenses for phones? What do you think about the new Moment 1.55x anamorphic lens? Let us know in the comments section underneath the article.