Don’t you hate not being able to zoom in with your smart phone camera. It always gets to me when I’m at one of my kid’s concerts and too far from the stage. I really want to capture smiling faces; but neither my iPhone, nor my wife’s Android phone can do the job by itself.
Carson Optical came up with a solution — the HookUpz Smartphone Optical Adapter. It lets you attach your binoculars (or other device with a similar type of eyepiece) to you smart phone camera, so you can do those close-ups. It’s not perfect; but works pretty well, as I have outlined in my review in TEQ Magazine. But it works; and it should work with microscopes and telescopes as well – so you can awe your friends with your spectacular images of the sky or micro world beneath us.
Here’s a comparison of images taken with and without the HookUpz Adapter using an iPhone 5S from a distance of about 5 car lengths. Notice how much crisper the one with the HookUpz is. According to manufacturer, you can get rid of the circular shape using your camera zoom; but I wasn’t able to do that.
In general, I like what the Carson HookUpz does; and will probably use it for those special occasions when I want to get up close — but not every time I take a photo.