The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning

Ed Nisley's Blog: Shop notes, electronics, firmware, machinery, 3D printing, laser cuttery, and curiosities. Contents: 100% human thinking, 0% AI slop.

The New Hotness

  • Google Pixel vs. Clip-on Lenses

    The clip-on lenses for the (fancy) camera  in my soon-to-be-obsolete Google Pixel XL don’t fit well on the case I added to improve its griptivity:

    Pixel vs Lens Clamp vs Case - angle
    Pixel vs Lens Clamp vs Case – angle

    The upper half of the clip rests on the rim of the case around the bezel, with only the end of the foam pad against the glass:

    Pixel vs Lens Clamp vs Case - angle overview
    Pixel vs Lens Clamp vs Case – angle overview

    That’s pretty much the only stable position.

    Sticking a disk of stair-tread rubber on the foam adds just enough thickness to match the rim:

    Pixel vs Lens Clamp vs Case - aligned
    Pixel vs Lens Clamp vs Case – aligned

    The lenses came with two clips, so I left one unmodified to fit the Pixel without the case:

    Pixel vs Lens Clamp vs Case - clamps
    Pixel vs Lens Clamp vs Case – clamps

    Not that that happens very often, but …

    The lenses are about as good as you’d expect for ten bucks from Amazon. Stacking the 0.67 “wide angle” lens on the camera enlarges the field-of-view by a third with closer focusing at maximum zoom, so the minimum FOV drops from 2 inches down to 1 inch at a reasonable distance.  The 10x “macro” lens is basically useless, with a focus distance well within the Pixel’s shadow under any normal lighting; if I were that sort of guy, I’d conjure a small LED ring powered from the USB-C port.