How to take a photo of a solar eclipse with your phone

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by Adriana Diaz

It will disappear in the blink of an eye, and darkness will continue due to the solar eclipse on Monday Up to 4 minutes and 28 seconds Depending on where you are in the path of the total eclipse when the Moon blocks the face of the Sun.

The photo lasts much longer, and some photographers have long been preparing for this big moment.

Astrophotographer Stan Honda He told CNN last week which it aims to achieve Fredericksburg, TexasWith hopes of clear skies. Although he plans to carry four cameras, you don't need that many to capture this extremely rare event.

“With almost any type of camera or any lens, you can get a good picture of the eclipse,” Honda explained. “I would just recommend a fairly sturdy tripod, to make your setup fairly stable, and a remote shutter release, because that allows you to take photos without blurring or moving the camera too much.”

Here are some other tips to help get that once-in-a-lifetime shot.

Get a solar filter

To fully experience totality, you'll need to be located along the path of totality, which is more than 100 miles wide, from Texas to Maine.

You'll also need a pair of sunglasses to protect your eyes and a sun filter to protect your smartphone camera from sunlight damaging the lens and overexposing your shot.

Smartphone ready solar filters include VisiSolar smartphone photo filter And the Solar Snap Eclipse suite of applications, Live Science Reports.

You can also make your own solar filter by grabbing the lens from a spare pair of sunglasses or sticking it over your smartphone's camera lens, according to the site. Dr. Ralph ChuProfessor Emeritus of Optometry and Vision Sciences at the University of Waterloo.

Adjust focus and exposure

Once you've secured your solar filter, you'll need to make sure you set the focus and exposure manually.

“The automatic settings won't work with the filter on, because most of the frame will be black, so it will be like taking a photo at night,” Honda told CNN. “Manual focus would be a big help too – you can autofocus on the sun, but then you have to disable autofocus so the camera doesn't try to stay focused through the filter. It's so dark that it will be fooled by the darkness and won't be able to focus.

To manually set focus on your phone, tap the moon on your screen.

On your iPhone, a small sun icon should appear to the right of the focus box. Drag the icon up or down to adjust exposure.

Android users will need to hold their finger on the moon on their screen for several seconds before moving their finger left or right to adjust focus.

Photographers will also want to turn off the flash to get a clear photo.

Be careful with zoom

When you zoom in, you often lose image quality depending on the device, so be careful about how close you get.

iPhone 15 Pro features a telephoto camera with 3x optical zoom – which The Washington Post reports You'll achieve the best quality – and up to 15x digital zoom.

Samsung Galaxy S Ultra phones have optical zoom ranging from 3x to 10x. Space Zoom feature allows up to 100x zoom.

But if you don't have those fancy phones, you can buy a $20 to $50 telephoto lens accessory to get a 12x to 18x view.

Use Burst Mode to capture the “Diamond Ring”

You should also practice the iPhone's Burst Mode feature – which Takes several photos at once – Before the big show.

The solar eclipse is expected to last about two and a half hours, but the most surprising part of the event is known as the “diamond ring,” which occurs immediately before and immediately after the totality.

“It's this very bright part of the sun, just in one corner — it looks like a ring with a diamond on it, and it only lasts for a few seconds, maybe 10 seconds or so,” Honda said.

Use burst mode to get your best shot when snapping a diamond ring.