FOR ABOUT THREE minutes on August 21, if you're lucky, you can watch the moon cross in front of the sun and block out its light in a total solar eclipse. Afterward, you can expect your Instagram feed to fill with pictures of the big event. If you want to get in on the action, make sure you get a good picture.

Sure, you could grab a DSLR with a fancy lens to get a crisp shot. But if a smartphone’s all you have, don't panic. It suffers some limitations, but with the right gear you can still get some great photos.

“Smartphones are really cool because they’re simple,” says Dr. Sten Odenwald, an astronomer and Director of Citizen Science for the Heliophysics Education Consortium at the NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center. “But trying to use them for astronomical photography is a very difficult thing to do. They’re not designed for that.” The resolution of your phone camera will limit how much of the eclipse you can see, so the end result might be grainier than you’d like.

Things are a bit more promising when you’re dealing with a solar eclipse, though. “The resolutionis going to be really bad,” Odenwald says, “but you’ll be able to tell it’s an eclipse.”

If you want a better picture, pick up some gear. Odenwald recommends a telephoto lens attachment like the Olloclip, Moment or Photojojo Iris. They feature a longer focal length, so you’ll see more of the moon’s details without resorting to a digital zoom, which can significantly decrease the image quality. You could also line up the eyepiece with your phone’s lens for a closer view of the eclipse. If you go this route, you can put a solar filter over your lens to focus solely on the eclipse, and even use some eclipse eyeglasses. If you’re in the line of totality, though, Odenwald says a filter shouldn’t be necessary.

You'll also want a tripod—either one designed specifically for smartphones or a mount to attach your phone to a conventional one—to avoid excessive noise in your picture. “The eclipse is going to be a once- or twice-in-a-lifetime event, and if you’re in the line of totality that investment is totally worth it,” Odenwald says.

Once you have your equipment, make a game plan. You shouldn’t go into the event unprepared, so Odenwald suggests practicing ahead of time by taking pictures of the moon. This will give you an idea of what exposure you’ll need to get the shot you’re looking for. Your phone’s autofocus and autoexposure should do the trick, but you can download a manual camera app for more fine-tuning.

You should shoot in RAW format, which will give you more details than JPEG, says György Soponyai, a nightscape photographer based in Hungary. “The foreground will be dark, the sky will be twilight-dark, and there will be a moderately bright circle there,” he says. “Using JPEG you might lose a lot of fine details.” To capture in RAW, download one of those manual camera apps. Try Halide or ProCam for iOS; on Android, there’s Manual Camera or Camera FV-5.

One more thing: These tips can help you get a good picture of the eclipse, but don't waste all three minutes trying to photograph it. “You should be looking at the eclipse, not your screen!” Odenwald says. For many of us, including Odenwald, this could be the first and last total solar eclipse we’ll witness. So set up your camera, snap a few shots, and then sit back and enjoy the view.

 

Source:  wired.com