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Get Glasses for Your Surface Pro 3 to Photograph Documents Clearly

 

One of my complaints about the Surface Pro 3 is that the fixed focus camera is totally unsuitable and unusable for capturing documents. You can’t get close enough and keep your documents in focus. All you get is a blurry mess.

I’ve tried using a macro lens designed for a smartphone with bad results. There have been some posts in Microsoft Communities about this, and lots of unhappy customers. Here’s a solution.

Your Surface Pro 3 needs glasses (or more correctly, a monocle).

I started with $17 rimless reading glasses +2.50 strength from WalMart.

start

Some snapping, twisting and bending to get to:

monocle

I hope to refine the above a little, but it was quick and dirty. I then put glasses on the Surface Pro 3 rear camera:

 

glasses on sp3

And took my first picture of a document. This is NOT retouched. Click or tap to open the image below full size.

 

output

Wonder if anyone will be inspired by this to Kickstarter a real accessory. Microsoft, you should make an accessory and provide it free of charge to your SP3 customers. You owe them at least that.