Millions of people set to see Monday’s solar eclipse will likely want to capture the rare moment the moon blocks the sun’s face with their smartphone.
Fortunately, capturing a nice image of the eclipse does not require professional-level equipment – though obviously that would help.
Professional photographers have shared tips on how to snap quality images, including holding your camera steady with a tripod, filtering light with eclipse glasses, and switching the camera to manual focus mode.
A woman uses solar filter glasses as she takes a photo of a solar eclipse with her smartphone in Islamabad on December 26, 2019.
A person records a video of the sun as it rises over New York City during a solar eclipse on June 10, 2021 as seen from The Edge observatory deck at The Hudson Yards.
READ MORE: How to tell if YOUR solar eclipse glasses are safe
Eclipse viewing glasses that block out 99 percent of ultraviolet light have been sold out for weeks in may places, while fakes flooded Amazon, eBay, and Temu.
Whether you have a proper camera or just a phone, you can set it up to take a photo of the eclipse, said photographer Stan Honda.
‘With pretty much any kind of camera or any lens, you can get a good picture of the eclipse,’ he told CNN.
‘I would just recommend a fairly sturdy tripod, to make your setup pretty steady, and a remote shutter release, because that allows you to take the pictures without jarring or moving the camera too much,’ Honda added.
Just as your eyes should be protected from the sun’s harmful rays during the eclipse, so too should your camera.
‘The phone sensor could be damaged just like any other image sensor if it’s pointed directly at the sun,’ NASA officials wrote in a post on X. ‘This is especially true if you’re using any sort of magnifying lens attachment on the phone.’
Therefore, a filter is necessary.
For eyes, the only glasses you should use to glimpse the celestial phenomenon are those that meet international standard ISO 12312-2, according to the American Optometric Association (AOA).
And your camera lens should also be protected with a filter that meets the same standard.
You could just hold or tape proper eclipse glasses over it.
‘A safe solar filter really is a necessity for the partial phases, and the American Astronomical Society has a whole section on its website about solar eclipse glasses and filters that they approve as being safe to use,’ Honda said.
Amos Yew (R) uses a lens on an iPhone with protective sunglasses over the lens to record video in the first stages of the total solar eclipse on August 21, 2017 in Madras, Oregon.
Kayla Ketz, left, uses a pair of eclipse glasses to photograph the solar eclipse with a smartphone as co-workers Joe Belovich, and Nancy Dyer, look on in Boston’s Seaport District on Monday, August 21, 2017.
Since phones may amplify the light, it is still not safe to view the eclipse through a phone camera.
And unfiltered photos could damage the camera lens.
Putting a filter over the lens will cut out most of the light, Honda said.
He also advised switching a camera into manual focus mode.
‘The automatic settings just won’t work with the filter on, because most of the frame will be black, so it’ll be like taking a picture at night,’ he said.
‘Manually focusing would be a big help, too — you can autofocus on the sun, but then you have to disable the autofocus so that your camera doesn’t try to keep focusing through the filter. It’s so dark that it’ll be fooled by the darkness, and it won’t be able to focus.’
Women look at a partial solar eclipse with sunglasses through a smartphone camera in Ankara, on October 25, 2022.
People use a smartphone to watch a rare ‘ring of fire’ solar eclipse in Beijing on December 26, 2019. A filter can be seen covering the phone camera lens.
For people in the path of totality, Honda has specific advice.
It is crucial to take the filter off the camera lens in that moment, or you won’t be able to see the light coming out from around the edges of the moon.
‘When you take the filter off, you’ll have to increase the exposure by quite a bit, because the corona itself is fairly dim, about the brightness of a full moon, so compared to the brightness of the sun that’s a pretty big difference,’ Honda said.
‘Keep the shutter speed and the ISO consistent and just slow down the shutter speed, because that will give you more and more exposure as you increase the time of the shutter speed, and you’ll catch more and more of the corona on each frame.’