How to: Lensball Photography

I was recently gifted a fascinating photography tool—a lens ball (or lensball). If you haven’t seen one, imagine a crystal ball that acts as a lens, creating mesmerizing photos by bending light a magnifying images.

First a quick safety warning: like any magnifying glass the lensball can concentrate sunlight providing a risk of fires, eye damage, or damage to your camera’s sensors. Never shoot directly through the lens ball toward the sun and be careful about placements.

I’ve only had a couple of chances to take this fun toy out to see what it could do, but in the short time, I could see that it presented a challenge. I wasn’t going to capturing the ideal images found on the Lensball website anytime soon.

Goal was to capture the clean colors and have a diagonal line or split right through the center of the frame. I loved the white snow and blue sky- but I was too cold to be outside for long.

Common Mistakes

Capturing my own fingers or the stand. Because almost all light that passes through is reflected, I had difficulty not having a large portion of the image shown through the lens ball contained whatever was holding it up- whether that was the ground, my own hand, or a stand.
Originality. Having looked at many examples of lens ball photography on Instagram before attempting my own, I found it difficult to find original applications that aren’t seen over and over again.
Focal Lenth/Aperture. I had incredibly difficult time capturing the image refracted through the lensball, while also capturing the nice background blur effect. I had to play around with various setting in order to capture the images how I wanted them.
Avoiding Smudges. Bring something to clean your lens ball- otherwise you won’t have crystal clear images- they will be hampered by smudges, dirt, and fingerprints.

The goal was to capture the pine trees- but most of the image is taken up by the forest floor. I took this photo while literally lying on the ground.

Tips for Beginners

Use a macro or a lens with a good close-up capability to get sharp images of the scenery within the ball.
Try placing it on elevated surfaces or holding it at various heights for new perspectives and less of the ground beneath your subject.
Most importantly, experiment! There’s no right or wrong way and you might surprise yourself.