Blood moon lunar eclipse tonight: Here’s how to capture the best photos with your smartphone

Also Read- Lunar Eclipse 2018: Here are the India timings for watching the century’s longest eclipse

Camera enthusiasts who wish to capture this event would need to know precise details, for instance, the time of occurrence, as well as the latitudes along which this celestial phenomenon will be visible. For those stargazers in New Delhi, they can witness the celestial event at around 1 am on July 27.

Also Read: Lunar Eclipse 2018 LIVE UPDATES: Date, timings and how to watch the blood moon

Users who have DSLR and a telephoto lens might be able to better document this striking phenomenon with better details. However, if you have a smartphone that you use as a daily driver for capturing photos, don’t worry you can still take the advantage of your device if you have the right gear. In this article, we have mentioned a few simple tricks to help you get your desired shot of the Blood Moon and Lunar Eclipse-

Lunar eclipse photography: Use external lens

Smartphone camera technology has evolved immensely over the past decade. Smartphones now deliver striking detailed photos with true-tone colours. Many smartphones these days integrate wide-angle or telephoto lens with OIS to offer stable and clear images while zooming in on a subject. However, these modern smartphones suffer from limitations while capturing photos in the low-light situation. Besides, in case of shooting an eclipse, the resolution of the phone might somehow limit how of much of the eclipse you can witness, and result in a grainier image. In such a situation, attaching an external telephoto lens can help to capture good eclipse shots. These lenses feature longer focal length which means you can get more details of the moon. There are many external lenses available in the online and brick and mortar stores, for instance, Olloclip Aukey photo lens for iPhones and Android smartphones or DMG 8X Zoom Magnifier Optical Telescope mobile phone camera lens.

External lenses feature longer focal length which means you can get more details of the moon (Image Source: Flipkart)

Also Read- Chandra Grahan or lunar eclipse on July 27, 2018: Century’s longest eclipse, blood moon explained

Lunar eclipse photography: Use tripod

A mobile tripod is another equipment that you would require besides an external lens. The tripod basically helps to get a stable image and limit excessive noise from creeping in the picture. Further, it saves the effort of holding the smartphone for a longer duration to get the best result. You can also take a gorilla pod stand which is lightweight and can be placed on any surface. Its flexible and ‘wrappable’ legs allow to comfortably place on a flat or rocky surface. The rubber foot grips further ensure stability in varied angles with the rubber grip holding the smartphone easily.

A mobile tripod can help avoid capturing shaky image (Image Source: Flipkart)

Lunar eclipse photography: Use Pro mode and HDR mode

Smartphone cameras earlier allowed only adjusting the White Balance and ISO, but with the advancement in technology and introduction of Pro/manual mode, users can now teak shutter speed, focus, aperture and exposure level for better composition. Incorporated in native camera app of the smartphone it enables adjusting the white balance and the level of sensitivity (ISO) to light. You can manually focus on the subject as well. While eclipse carries both dark and light areas, it is recommended to keep the HDR mode on in your smartphone. The mode basically takes several images clicked at different exposures in quick succession and merges them using the software. By combining these multiple images it produces a single image with brighter colours and better contrast. However, there is a fear that some detail will be lost in the process.

While all these modes should do the trick of capturing a better shot of the eclipse, the most important point is to make sure you arrive early and grab the perfect spot to capture the Blood Moon and lunar eclipse

Lunar eclipse photography: Lock focus and exposure

The autofocus in the smartphone works well in good lighting condition. However, the mode might not yield the same output while shooting dark scenes. In such a situation, it is better to manually focus on the subject to avoid losing detail. For focusing manually, all you need to do is tap on the subject in the viewfinder and then click it. The manual focus helps you to have ‘grain control’ over the focal point.

Getting proper exposure might not be easy during an eclipse. To get better output, just tap on the subject to focus and then adjust exposure till you see detail in the ‘eclipse”. The mobile tripod can further enhance by allowing to shoot the same image several times under different exposure (EV) settings and then combine them together. You can also use remote shutter for continuous shoot. Instead of glueing your eyes on the phone’s display to tap on the moon at the precise moment you can just use the remote shutter that will trigger the camera and take the shot. This will also help avoid shake from the tap.

Lunar eclipse photography: Record time-lapse

In case you don’t want to lose all your energy trying to photograph the eclipse you can use time-lapse mode as an alternate solution. Smartphones from leading OEMs like Samsung, Apple, OnePlus etc now come with inbuilt time-lapse mode. The mode which you will find in the native camera app can be accessed on the camera menu. With the time-lapse mode, you can shoot the entire eclipse. For this, you just need to open the camera app; select time-lapse mode and the rest will be done by the phone.

Also Read- Total lunar eclipse and blood moon on July 27: Here’s why this event is unique

Photo editing app

While these tips will help you to capture a good photo of the eclipse, you can download a few photo editing apps to gain more control and fine-tune the image. Shooting image in RAW format will further help you get more detail than JPEG. For this, you can use apps like Pro Cam, Camera FV-5 etc that enables to tweak highlights, shadows, colour and contrast and refine details.

Arrive early to get the perfect spot

While all these modes should do the trick of capturing a better shot of the eclipse, the most important point is to make sure you arrive early and grab the perfect spot to capture the Blood Moon and lunar eclipse. You can surf certain websites to check how the eclipse will appear in your location.