f8 Lens Toolkit iOS App – Camera/Lens Database for Photographic Calculations

Apps for Everything on Set

Mobile phones today, and smartphones of course in particular, have come a long way from the time when we only used them for calls and text message. They have become Swiss Army knives for endless purposes, provided you have the right app. Using the constantly evolving smartphone camera is one thing, but another good example of smartphone integration on set for professionals can be all sorts of remote control apps. Many light manufacturers develop smartphone apps to provide control for their fixtures, almost every gimbal nowadays can be controlled with a smartphone app, there are apps for camera control, and so on. It seems that a modern-day filmmaker needs a smartphone all the time.

Apart from the apps providing wireless control to all sorts of gadgets, there are also apps that can help filmmakers by providing useful information. One example might be apps showing the exact position of the sun and the time of the golden hour, blue hour, director’s viewfinder apps and so on. The newly launched f8 Lens Toolkit app from distant blue mobile solutions (who also make the popular Cadrage Director’s Viewfinder app) also provides useful information for depth of field calculations and much more. Let’s take a short look at what the app can do.

f8 Lens Toolkit App

f8 Lens Toolkit app. Source: distant blue

The f8 Lens Toolkit app includes useful photographic calculations like:

Depth of field & hyperfocal distance calculator

Field of view calculator

Lens matcher: equivalent focal length & f-stop

Camera sensor comparison tool

The app includes data from thousands of cameras & lenses as well as close focus and aperture data for most lenses. It also supports anamorphic shooting & Metabones Speedboosters.

While this is not the only app out there with such functionality, the app’s developers claim that the f8 Lens Toolkit is the fastest and easiest iOS app with such features.

The important values like close focus and aperture data of each lens are marked by bold text, so users always see these when doing their calculations. The input information for the calculations like focal length, aperture, and distance can be entered using the sliders at the bottom or directly by typing them in.

f8 Lens Toolkit app. Source: distant blue

The app’s developers say they were focusing on a simple and easy to use GUI when developing the f8 Lens Toolkit. At cinema5D, we are currently using this app so stay tuned for a future hands-on article.

Price and Availability

The f8 Lens Toolkit replaces the previous Lens Matcher app and it is free for all existing (Lens Matcher) users. For new users, the app can be purchased alone for $11.99 (€12.99) or in a “Cinematography Bundle” with Cadrage Director’s Viewfinder app for $24.99 (€27.99). Since it is an iOS app, it is available at the App Store now. It is not clear yet whether there will be an Android version as well.

Do you use some kind of app making photographic calculations for you? What do you think of the f8 Lens Toolkit app? Let us know in the comments underneath the article.