This iPhone accessory will turn you into J.J. Abrams

A new project is raising money on Kickstarter to build an anamorphic adapter lens that would be compatible with the iPhone 5 and iPhone 5s, letting users record video reminiscent of a J.J. Abrams movie. With 16 days to go, the project has already surpassed its $30,000 goal, which means that backers will likely receive the new iPhone accessory at some point in March 2014, when it’s expected to begin shipping.

You know anamorphic, right? It’s a way of getting super widescreen film onto the relatively squarish frame of 35mm film. It’s done by using a special lens on the camera that squeezes the image sideways, and then a reverse lens on the projector that stretches it back out again when you watch it. This is why, in the bad old days of non-letterboxed video, you’d sometimes see the end movie credits squished up to fit them onto your TV screen, all while the rest of the move had just been shown with it’s sides chopped off.