In weak lensing by large-scale structure, the thin-lens approximation may break down, and low-density extended structures may not be well approximated by multiple thin-lens planes. In this case, the deflection can be derived by instead assuming that the gravitational potential is slowly varying everywhere (for this reason, this approximation is not valid for strong lensing). This approach assumes the universe is well described by a Newtonian-perturbed FRW metric, but it makes no other assumptions about the distribution of the lensing mass.