It’s 2025, and the latest innovation from the photography industry is a lens designed to resemble a famed cookie, built from repurposed parts.
‘Add the authentic look of disposable film cameras to your mirrorless [camera] with genuine film optics’, says retro-pia.com, a website selling the lens.
The claim that this is a genuine film optic is indeed accurate, as the lens element is taken straight from a disposable camera, which is then worked into the cookie lens available in today’s most popular mirrorless camera lens mounts, including Sony, Canon, Fujifilm and more.
I only wish this were satire.
Of course, I bought one to see it for myself, but not at the incredible $39 / £30 that one Instagram advert was selling it at (and that’s 30% off the original price).
Instead, I went straight to the source – AliExpress and parted with just £12 (about $15) – the same price as 168 Oreo cookies. It wasn’t lost on me that the price is actually cheaper than you would pay for a disposable camera these days. Two weeks later, arguably the worst lens that I have ever used arrived ahead of a family trip to Paris, France.
Can something so bad, be good?
The lens has an approximate 32mm focal length, a fixed f/11 aperture and fixed infinity focus – everything beyond 5ft / 1.5m should be in focus. At least that is the theory.
The entire thing is made from plastic, including the lens mount. Rather than a lens, it would be more apt to describe this tool as an elaborate lens cap.
By any objective measure, the lens is an abomination; it can’t be classified as sharp, so don’t expect any fine details; there is significant vignetting, which, of course, adds to its retro character; everything is soft, and there are pronounced lens aberrations going on.
To be clear, I love characterful vintage lenses, featuring the likes of chrome bezels, metal barrels, minimal coatings, and lens flares. My favourite lens is a Nikkor 50mm F/1.4 E lens from the 1960s.
Still, the cookie lens exhibits vintage character and multiplies it to a level of awfulness that optical engineers have spent decades and millions of Yen trying to escape from.
So why has this work of creative Instagram marketing been a fairly consistent presence on my Sony camera?
First up is the practicality; the Oreo-style lens has quite literally replaced my lens cap. It is so thin that it makes no difference to keep it on my camera at all times. My Sony Alpha is ready to go, pull out, and take a shot at any moment. I don’t even bother with camera settings – what will be, will be.
I’ve used the lens just like I would a disposable camera, taking snapshots of family and moments, and quite honestly, image quality doesn’t matter.
Let’s be real for a minute – 99% of our images are viewed on screens that are smaller than 10 inches, with a resolution less than 4k (around 8 megapixels). You are most likely looking at the images now thinking ‘they don’t look too bad’.
This goes against everything I, as a pixel-peeping camera reviewer and photographer, stand for. Still, there are occasions when it is the moment that matters rather than the optical excellence.
The fact that this very 1980s / 90s aesthetic is now considered retro horrifies me, a 40-something-year-old man. I have actual prints from disposable cameras that have the same vignette, lack of definition and contrast as the images that this lens produces.
With a tweak in Adobe Lightroom (on my phone, of course), the photos of my children resemble the 6×4-inch prints I have of myself as a child. There is something very nostalgic about it.
There is also a freedom that comes with this poor quality lens. Taking a proper mirrorless camera that costs around $2,500 / £2,000, setting it to Aperture Priority and Auto ISO, and turning it into a point-and-shoot camera, with no worries about depth of field or focusing, is liberating; stop worrying about settings and pixels, and capture the moment instead!
An awful gimmick?
Suppose you do want to take your chances with a drop shipper, such as Temu, AliExpress or resellers on Amazon, this is likely the cheapest ‘new’ lens you will ever buy for your camera.
Continuing with the positives, the practicalities of the lens are great; it is extremely small and light, and can live on your camera.
It’s also widely available – the pricier Retropia site lists the Repurposed Disposable Camera Lens for Sony E, Canon RF, Canon EF-M, Nikon Z, Fujifilm X, MFT, L-mount, Leica M and more.
However, this lens is not your only option. The Viltrox AF 28mm F4.5 lens is approximately the same size, features autofocus, and produces significantly better images, albeit at a more reassuring, price of around $100 / £90 (or 1,260 actual Oreos). You can leave this lens on your camera and enjoy it much the same point-and-shoot way as the ‘Oreo’ lens.
You can probably tell I have a like/hate relationship with the Oreo lens – it’s optical quality should be consigned to the past, and it’s an awful gimmick.
What I will say, though, it has retaught me a valuable lesson – that sometimes working with constraints and stepping outside our comfort zones can trigger our creativity; we can see the world differently.
Perhaps the next time I am shooting portraits I’ll start using on-camera flash, editing the images to have a chronic vignette, adding a slight Gaussian blur to the highlights and go fully in on the disposable camera aesthetic, whilst fighting back the tears that the saying ‘everything old is new again’ has finally caught up with me.
