I don't want to start a "who did it first" because I don't know for sure, but given when this was posted, it feels wrong not to mention Tito Ferradans [0][1] at all. From what I can tell, he is the one who really popularised this mod and if you're interested in getting that anamorphic look on a (relative) budget, his channel is full of great tips.
I modded a vintage Leica Summicron about 10 years ago using some metal a colleague machined to try the effect mentioned in the article. Did it have anamorphic bokeh? Sure. But it never gave me the feel of anamorphic, as the look is all in the desqueeze. Since it sat in between weirdo spherical and anamorphic, I just never found much use for it.
To be fair we were doing this in the 80s with crappy M42 lenses and slightly less scientific method. Pentax 50mm one that came with your GDR clunker could be pushed pretty hard if you were on a budget.
The main reason for this though was to make the bokeh look like it was from a more expensive lens.
I've used this technique sometime ago, with an minolta srt-101. The lens it came with (55mm f1.8) had the elements screwable by hand, making the mod easy.
It will look similar to an anamorphic lens, but not exactly like it. The lens flares will be different for instance, and the color fringing, too. But it's pretty close to the real thing.
Not sure why you'd want an oval aperture on a lens... but if you wanted the thinnest possible light blocking area while maintaining material strength, could you make a thicker print which tapers down to a thin opening at the edges of the aperture?
Anamorphic lenses used in cinema compressed the light horizontally to squeeze a wider aspect ratio onto a narrower strip of film.
It's funny that we chase what amounts to an (unfortunate?) artifact that a normally round aperture becomes oval.
An actual anamorphic lens on a 35mm camera body would be interesting as you would actually also get the wider aspect ratio. I imagine they either do not exist or that they would be prohibitively expensive — thus this "hack" (and I use the term with fondness).
Edit: I see there are anamorphic lenses in the $600 to $1200 or so range on Amazon. Kind of annoying I suppose to have to stretch everything in post.
> Also, I have to say that I didn’t notice a significant sharpness difference between 0.1mm and 2mm disks. I usually aim for a thickness of around 0.33mm (or 2/3 printing layers) This will produce plastic disks that are firm, thin, and a bit flexible.
Since regular bokeh on smartphones is usually emulated (portrait mode), if you want comparable amount of anamorphic bokeh then software is the way to go too.
Searching for anamorphic bokeh in an app store returns some results.
Readit News
[0] https://www.tferradans.com/ [1] https://youtube.com/c/AnamorphicOnABudget
The main reason for this though was to make the bokeh look like it was from a more expensive lens.
I've used this technique sometime ago, with an minolta srt-101. The lens it came with (55mm f1.8) had the elements screwable by hand, making the mod easy.
[1]https://troialog.tumblr.com/
https://64.media.tumblr.com/c4a110c4bf7013f082e81b3561bf6791...
Stay young.
Edit: I mixed this up with the iPhone 14 lens attachment. (Which is the real thing.)
The article says: “to produce the type of anamorphic boke you can see in the movies”.
See also: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anamorphic_format
It's funny that we chase what amounts to an (unfortunate?) artifact that a normally round aperture becomes oval.
An actual anamorphic lens on a 35mm camera body would be interesting as you would actually also get the wider aspect ratio. I imagine they either do not exist or that they would be prohibitively expensive — thus this "hack" (and I use the term with fondness).
Edit: I see there are anamorphic lenses in the $600 to $1200 or so range on Amazon. Kind of annoying I suppose to have to stretch everything in post.
> Also, I have to say that I didn’t notice a significant sharpness difference between 0.1mm and 2mm disks. I usually aim for a thickness of around 0.33mm (or 2/3 printing layers) This will produce plastic disks that are firm, thin, and a bit flexible.
Searching for anamorphic bokeh in an app store returns some results.
I've posted worse comments lying in bed tired, half-dead, and down with a cold.