You’ve seen it a thousand times in high-budget cinema. The camera glides effortlessly toward a character’s eye, and suddenly, you’re inside their memories. Or maybe it’s a shot where the lens pushes right through a glass window without a crack, or dives deep into the microscopic gears of a watch. It looks like magic. It feels impossible. But honestly, learning how to move camera through lens isn't about breaking the laws of physics; it's about a very specific mix of clever physical rigging and digital sleight of hand.
People often get this wrong. They think you just need a really small camera. While a tiny sensor helps, the "portal" effect is actually a legacy trick that has evolved from old-school physical models to the modern CGI era.
The Physical Reality of the "Impossible" Move
In the old days—think the 1970s and 80s—if a director wanted to move the camera through a lens or a solid object, they had to build "breakaway" props. If you were zooming into a camera lens, you’d build a massive, oversized model of that lens. This allowed a standard-sized film camera to physically pass through the center. It’s a bit lo-fi by today’s standards, but the tactile feel of real light hitting real glass is still hard to beat.
Today, we mostly use probe lenses. You’ve probably seen the Laowa 24mm f/14 Probe. It looks like a long, skinny snorkel. Because the barrel is so thin, you can poke it into gaps that a normal DSLR body could never dream of entering. You can slide it through a keyhole or between the narrow gaps of a circuit board. This is the most "honest" way to handle the shot because the move is 100% physical. There's no stitching. No masking. Just a very strange-looking lens doing exactly what it was designed for.
But what if the hole is smaller than the probe? What if you want to go through a solid piece of glass? That’s where things get technical.
The Seamless Stitch Technique
Most of the mind-bending "through the glass" shots you see in modern Netflix shows use a "double-plate" system. Basically, you’re filming two separate shots and "stitching" them together in post-production using a software like Adobe After Effects or DaVinci Resolve.
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First, you film the "A-side." This is the camera approaching the object—say, a camera lens or a window. You move the camera as close as possible until the lens is literally touching the surface. Then, you film the "B-side." This is the shot from the other side of the "barrier," starting from the exact same position and moving forward.
To make this work, the movement has to be identical. If your speed wobbles even a little bit, the illusion breaks. This is why professionals use Motion Control (MoCo) rigs. These are robotic arms, like the Bolt High-Speed Cinebot, that can repeat the exact same movement down to the millimeter. You run the move once with the window in place, then run it again with the window removed. In post, you create a digital mask that wipes from the first shot to the second as the camera "passes through."
Why Your Handheld Shots Aren't Working
A lot of beginners try to do this handheld. It almost never looks right. Why? Because of parallax. When you move a camera, the relationship between foreground and background objects shifts. If your "A" shot and "B" shot don't have perfectly aligned perspective, your brain immediately flags the transition as "fake." It looks like a cheap cross-dissolve rather than a physical movement.
If you don't have a $50,000 robot arm, you can use a slider. It’s a simple rail. It keeps the camera on a single axis. By measuring your distance carefully and using a high frame rate, you can get close enough to a "pro" look to fool most viewers.
Another trick is the "digital zoom" or "Ken Burns" on steroids. You film in 8K resolution but deliver in 4K. This gives you massive "room" to crop into the image. You can start with a wide shot and digitally push into the lens of a prop camera until that lens fills the entire frame. Since the resolution is so high, it doesn't look pixelated. Once the black center of the lens fills the screen, you cut to your next shot. It's a classic "match cut."
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The Macro Problem: Light and Depth of Field
When you're trying to move a camera through a lens or any tiny space, you run into the two monsters of macro photography: diffraction and light loss.
- Light is your best friend. Tiny lenses, especially probe lenses, have very small apertures (like f/14 or f/22). They need a massive amount of light. If you're shooting inside a lens or a small box, it’s going to be pitch black. Professionals use "ice lights" or tiny LED "fingers" to pump light into the micro-environment.
- Depth of field is paper-thin. The closer you get to an object, the blurrier the background becomes. If you want the "through the lens" move to feel epic, you usually want everything to be sharp. This often requires focus stacking or using a very small sensor (like a 1/2-inch sensor) which naturally has a deeper depth of field than a full-frame Sony A7S III or a RED.
Real-World Examples to Study
Look at the opening of Fight Club. The camera moves through the internal structure of a human brain, through pores of skin, and out past a gun barrel. That wasn't a real camera, obviously. It was a "photogrammetry" move where thousands of still photos were stitched into a 3D environment.
Then you have Citizen Kane. Orson Welles famously had floors cut out of the set so the camera could drop down and move "through" tables and furniture. He didn't have CGI. He just had a chainsaw and a lot of nerve.
In the 2019 film 1917, Roger Deakins used a specialized "Stabileye" rig to move the camera through narrow trenches and windows. The camera body was stripped down to the bare essentials to fit through gaps that a standard rig couldn't clear. It’s about being willing to take the camera apart if that’s what the shot needs.
Practical Steps for Your Next Project
If you're ready to try this, don't just start swinging your camera around. Plan the "seam." Every through-the-lens shot has a seam where two worlds meet.
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- Find a "Dark Point": The easiest way to move through a lens is to find a spot in the glass or the machinery that is pure black. When the screen goes 100% black, you can transition to any other shot in the world and it will look seamless.
- Use a High Shutter Speed: Motion blur is the enemy of a clean stitch. If you shoot at a high shutter speed (like 1/200 or 1/500), the individual frames will be sharp. You can always add "fake" motion blur back in during post-production using a plugin like RSMB (ReelSmart Motion Blur).
- Scale the Prop: If you’re struggling to get the camera through a small hole, make the hole bigger. Seriously. Building a 2x scale model of a lens or a keyhole is often cheaper and faster than trying to fight the physics of a tiny space with a big camera.
Hardware Check: What Do You Actually Need?
You don't need a Hollywood budget, but you do need the right "type" of gear. A GoPro is actually one of the best tools for this. Because it's so small and has a near-infinite focus (everything from a few inches away to infinity is usually sharp), you can physically shove it through spaces where a "real" cinema camera would get stuck.
Pair a small action cam with a motorized slider and you have a "poor man's MoCo." Use the slider to ensure the move is straight. If you're doing a "through the lens" shot into a mirror, remember that you’ll see the camera reflection. You’ll have to paint that out in post-production using a "clean plate"—a shot of the mirror without the camera in the way.
Moving Forward With Your Shot
To master the "through the lens" movement, start with a simple match cut. Place a camera on a tripod. Film yourself pushing a second camera (the "prop") directly toward the lens of the first. Then, switch perspectives. Film from the prop camera's point of view as it moves toward a person.
Once you can align those two movements in your editing software, you've cracked the code. The rest is just adding "texture"—dust motes in the air, digital lens flares, and sound design. Never underestimate sound design. The "whoosh" sound as the camera passes through the glass is what actually sells the illusion to the audience's brain.
Actionable Next Steps:
- Measure your "entry point": Use a caliper to find the exact diameter of the lens or opening you want to pass through.
- Build a guide rail: Even a piece of 2x4 wood can act as a physical guide to keep your camera move perfectly straight if you don't have a slider.
- Shoot at 60fps or higher: This gives you more frames to work with when you're trying to align the "A" and "B" sides of your transition in the editing room.
- Clear the "Clean Plate": Always take a photo of the scene without the camera or any actors in it. You will almost certainly need this "empty" image to patch holes or hide reflections later.