As long as there have been smartphones, there have been goofy-ass mashups between phones and cameras. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n
We\u2019ve had cameras that clamp to your phone<\/a> or attach by magnets<\/a>. We\u2019ve had accessory lenses<\/a> and shutter grips<\/a> to make your phone act more like a camera. We\u2019ve had cameras that were also<\/em> kind of phones<\/a>. None of them have been good enough to convince the masses, and everyone seems to have settled into an agreement that phones can just look like phones and cameras can just piggyback on your mobile data as needed. A sane world is a just world, etc.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n I was ready to close that particular chapter of the digital photography history book when Xiaomi announced its 13 Ultra<\/a> with a camera accessory kit<\/a> for an extra 999 yuan (about $137, though eBay resellers are asking for around $200). \u201cOh ho ho!\u201d <\/em>I chuckled smugly. \u201cNot this<\/em> old chestnut again!\u201d Six months later, the joke\u2019s on me because it\u2019s actually really good \u2014 it\u2019s just a shame that the camera and kit aren\u2019t officially sold in the US and likely never will be.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The key to this particular phone \/ camera mashup\u2019s success \u2014 and I can\u2019t overstate the importance of this feature \u2014 is that you don\u2019t look like an absolute dingus using it.<\/em> It\u2019s all relatively low profile, at least until you start using the filter holder, but that\u2019s on you. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n At its core, the kit includes a normal-looking phone case and a shutter grip that slides on when you want it and clicks into place. It\u2019s easy to take the shutter off when you want to use your phone like a normal phone. The grip\u2019s two-stage shutter connects to the camera via Bluetooth. There\u2019s also a wrist strap attachment, and if there\u2019s a single most underrated camera accessory, I think it\u2019s the humble wrist strap. I want one on every phone.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n There\u2019s a mostly ornamental screw-on lens cap and the aforementioned 67mm filter adapter. I snapped the grip into place and headed to one of Seattle\u2019s favorite tourist destinations to Do Photography for a couple of hours.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n I once heard a description from a mushroom forager that you need to \u201cget your eyes on\u201d when you\u2019re on the hunt. You go to your foraging spot and start looking, but at some point, another sense kicks into gear. You start spotting the morels or whatever you\u2019re after more easily. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n In my experience, photography is like that, too. Anytime I go into a situation intent on Doing Photography, I\u2019ll struggle for a bit, and then I \u201cget my eyes on\u201d and start seeing better photos. And there\u2019s something about having a camera-shaped thing in my hand that helps me get my eyes on.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n That was the case at least when I walked around Seattle Center on a sunny Tuesday afternoon with the Xiaomi 13 Ultra. Sure, the camera grip makes it more comfortable to hold the phone while you take a photo. And the physical shutter button helps you keep more attention on your subject rather than on the screen. But at least 50 percent of the kit\u2019s utility \u2014 at least for me \u2014 is straight-up in my head. It helps put me in a photography mindset faster, much like a dedicated camera does.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Crucially, the 13 Ultra is also an absolute unit<\/em>. There are four rear-facing cameras, one of which features a huge one-inch-type sensor. There are 5x and 3.2x telephoto lenses, plus an ultrawide. The main camera also includes a 2x crop zoom. It\u2019s a smorgasbord of camera hardware, and the software backing it up ain\u2019t too shabby, either. It\u2019s all Leica-branded, down to the color processing, which you should take with a grain of salt. But I\u2019ll be damned if I didn\u2019t take some of my favorite portraits of the past year with this thing. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n Of course, the 13 Ultra suffers from the same problems that trip up even the best modern phone cameras. It has a hard time freezing moving subjects in dim light, occasionally goes HAM on color saturation, and doesn\u2019t always hold onto fine detail as well as a camera with a bigger sensor. (Take a look at the kiddo\u2019s hair in the shot above.) And the vignetting in some of the portrait mode settings goes a little hard for my taste. But it\u2019s easily one of my favorite mobile cameras of the past year, and I dearly wish we could buy it in the US.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n You don\u2019t need a top-of-the-line camera to take nice photos. You certainly don\u2019t need a fancy camera grip for your phone to enjoy taking photos with it. But Xiaomi\u2019s take on the old phone-is-a-camera concept is the smartest one I\u2019ve come across, and I think it helped put me in a mindset to take better photos. If there\u2019s an accessory \u2014 magnet, clamp, grip, or whatever \u2014 that helps you enjoy taking photos with your phone, then that\u2019s a pretty good thing in my book. It\u2019s just a nice bonus if it doesn\u2019t make you look like a huge dingus.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n