Director's viewfinder for iPhone and iPad
Pick a camera body, a recording mode, an aspect ratio and a lens, and the phone's live picture is cropped to show exactly what that combination would frame. For directors, DPs and camera assistants standing on a location with the real camera still in the truck.
$19.99, once.
Included with your Cutvey membership.
It tells you what it is
The frame is computed, never guessed at: the sensor's active area and the lens's marked focal length go in, and the app solves for the zoom that makes the phone's own field of view match. That field of view is read from the hardware at runtime, per module and per capture format, so the app is right about a phone that did not exist when it was built.
What it will not do is pretend. Phone modules vary between handsets, a marked focal length is nominal, and no phone is an ALEXA. Use it to choose the lens, the height and the position; confirm the frame on the real camera before you commit to a location, a build or a shot that cannot be redone.
01 Frame
The frame lines sit on the live view with the readout under them: focal length, the angle it covers, the module in use and the depth of field. OVERVIEW draws the whole kit at once, so the choice between a 35 and a 50 is a look rather than an argument. Tap the picture and the chrome goes away.
02 Set up
570 bodies and 3,241 lenses ship inside the app, cine and photo, current and legacy, each entry carrying the manufacturer document it was verified against. Where a number was derived rather than published, the row says so in the picker instead of quietly rounding. Add your own bodies and lens series, save a setup, and swap a whole kit in two taps.
03 Scout
Stand where the camera will stand and the sun's path lays over the same picture, with sunrise, noon and sunset, golden and blue hour, and a scrubber that walks the sun round the day. The position follows the NOAA solar algorithm. The direction it is drawn in comes from the phone's compass, which the app says out loud, with a nudge to align the disc to the real sun when there is metal about.
04 Keep
Photos and video keep the frame lines and the setup burned in, with the numbers in the EXIF. They collect into projects, and a project prints as a PDF shot list the director, the DP and the AD can all read. Save what you want to the photo library; the app writes to it and never reads it back.
On the location
Choose the body, the recording mode and the aspect you are cutting to. The setup sticks until you change it, and a kit swaps the glass in two taps.
Hold the phone where the camera goes. Step the lens with the chevrons, or ramp a zoom by holding them, and read the angle and the depth of field off the strip.
Shoot the frame. It lands in the gallery with the lens, the mode, the aspect and the location, ready to file into a project and print as a shot list.
Beyond the phone in your hand
The same frame, the same numbers, wherever the shot needs to be looked at.
Turn the phone upright and the layout is built for it. Say whether the vertical frame is extracted from the gate or the camera is turned on its side; each has its own field of view, and both are written into the shot list and the EXIF so the editor knows which one you framed.
The Apple Watch app shows the frame, the lens and the angle, records with a tap, and turns the zoom with the Digital Crown. It talks to the paired phone and to nothing else, so it works on a stage with no signal.
Plug the phone into a display and the picture goes out clean, with a lower third that names the camera, the lens and the aspect. The client sees the frame; the operator keeps the controls.
Questions
More on the support page, with a form that reaches a person.
An iPhone or iPad running iOS 17 or later. The viewfinder reads through the back camera, so it needs a real scene in front of it. Everything else, the camera bodies, the lenses and the sun, is computed on the device and works without a signal.
It is a simulation, and it is built to be honest about that. The frame is computed from the sensor's active area and the lens's marked focal length, and the phone's own field of view is read from the hardware at runtime, per module and per capture format. Confirm the real frame on the real camera and lens before you commit to a location, a build or a lens package.
Yes. The gear database is bundled in the app and the sun is computed on the device. Your frames, shot lists and locations never leave the phone. If you unlocked with a Cutvey membership the app keeps working for up to seven days out of signal; a $19.99 purchase never needs the network at all.
$19.99, once. The purchase belongs to your Apple Account and restores on any iPhone or iPad running iOS 17 or later. It is also included with a Cutvey membership: sign in instead and the app unlocks with nothing to buy.
570 camera bodies, 1,885 recording modes, 574 lens series and 3,241 individual lenses, cine and photo, current and legacy. Every entry carries the manufacturer document it was verified against, and a row whose numbers were derived rather than published is flagged as provisional in the picker. You can add your own bodies and lens series too, and Settings has a row that mails us a request.
Unlock forever
The whole app, forever. One payment, no subscription, no upgrades to buy later. Restores on any iPhone or iPad running iOS 17 or later and signed into the same Apple Account, and never asks a server for permission again.
Download on the App StoreAlready on Cutvey?
Cutvey Viewfinder is part of the Cutvey production toolkit. Members sign in with their email and a one-time code, on up to three devices each, and the app unlocks with nothing to buy. One activation is one person, and a plan carries as many as it has seats.