Among the many unintended consequences of the 30-year AIDS epidemic has been a profound change in status for other sexually transmitted diseases. It feels slightly bizarre, for anyone who came of age after HIV arrived, to realize that syphilis and gonorrhea and their ilk were once as profoundly dreaded as AIDS is now, so important that they were considered major threats to military campaigns and were the first treatment targets for the earliest antimicrobial drugs.

Judging by data released Friday by the Centers for Disease Control, it might be time to take them seriously once again.

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Miniature robots shot by the LensBaby. Photo: Charlie Sorrel/Wired.com

Want to surprise yourself? Try putting a crappy, plastic lens onto your high-end digital camera.

We call these artistically ironic adapters “toy lenses,” and the hard-to-control analog results are often quite startling and serendipitous. By contrast, grunge-ifying your photos with software (think Instagram) is both repeatable and predictable.

The latest toy lens comes from Japanese company SLR Magic. Here’s what it does, plus a look at a few other purposely junky lenses.

This lens even looks like a toy, and comes with a bagful...