Photographing a Lunar Eclipse – The Complete Guide

On January 10, 2020, another lunar eclipse will occur, offering a rare and promising opportunity for photographers to try their hand at a unique subject. Not only photos but also time-lapse recordings of lunar eclipses are particularly popular. However, this type of photography is not that easy, and integrating the surroundings into the unique light of a lunar eclipse often poses challenges for photographers, for example.

To ensure your photo session is a success and you don't have to wait until the next event with blurry pictures, we'll show you how to photograph it correctly, what equipment you need, and what to look out for. This way, you'll capture your most beautiful pictures at the next lunar eclipse. Important considerations include choosing the right ISO values, exposure time, and accessories such as a tripod, Astroklar Night Light Filter & remote release. But let's start again with the basics.

What is a lunar eclipse and which type of eclipse is occurring?

On January 10, 2020, a penumbral lunar eclipse will occur, meaning the Earth is located between the Sun and the Moon. In this event, the Earth's shadow, illuminated by the Sun, falls on the Moon. However, in a penumbral eclipse, the Sun, Earth, and Moon do not form a perfectly straight line. The Moon thus only passes into the outer shadow of the Earth on its lunar orbit and continues to be illuminated by the Sun.

The reason we can still see the Moon with the naked eye during a total lunar eclipse is that it still reflects residual light shining on it from other areas of the universe.

Unlike the Sun during a solar eclipse, the side of the Moon facing us never completely darkens. As soon as it enters the Earth's shadow, it often glows with a pale or coppery red hue, which is why it is then referred to as a Blood Moon. During a Blood Moon, sunlight is refracted in the Earth's atmosphere and casts a reddish glow as a shadow on the Moon.

Tips for photographing a lunar eclipse

Below, we list the most important photo tips and correct settings you need for the most beautiful lunar eclipse photos. Some of these tips are also suitable for normal moon photography. However, there are special challenges that must be mastered during an eclipse.

• Choose the darkest possible observation spot with a good view; due to light pollution, it should be far away from major cities.
• Since the moon will be about 10 to 20 degrees above the horizon, you should have as clear a view as possible to the south and east.
• Skylines, mountain ridges, and treetops in the picture can enhance images, but are especially recommended for advanced photographers.

You should also keep the following things in mind:

• Weather forecast – a few clouds can add accents and create atmosphere, but a closed cloud cover makes pictures impossible.
• Depending on the phase of the lunar eclipse, different exposure times and lenses are recommended. A full moon is also a particular challenge due to the amount of light.
• Keep the times for moonrise and moonset in mind.
• Also keep the same times for the sun in mind – the reddish sky after sunset creates good photos with a special atmosphere.
• The online available times for sunrise and sunset of the sun and moon refer to a straight horizon. If you are photographing in the mountains, the times will shift accordingly.

Equipment check:

1. Solid tripod for shake-free long exposures. To capture the dark moonlight, normal moon photography already uses exposure times of several seconds. During a lunar eclipse, this time is extended. Nevertheless, the exposure time should be kept as short as possible, as the moon moves relative to the Earth, and this becomes noticeable as motion blur from an exposure time of one second.
2. For shake-free shots, Rollei's wireless and cable remote releases are suitable. They guarantee shake-free triggering.
3. Astroklar Night Light Filter against light pollution from artificial light sources that cause yellow casts in night sky and astrophotography.
4. Neutral Density Filters (ND) reduce the amount of incoming light (caution: exposure time increases significantly), but do not distort the color of the moon. When photographing without ND, the moon may appear white and lacking in contrast. Using light ND filters can better bring out the contrast of the lunar surface, as the camera has more image information available.
5. Long focal lengths are required for the distance to the moon. A 70-300 millimeter telephoto lens (full-frame rather 500mm) is a good guide, although more is certainly possible. An extender can also be used. The choice of focal length depends heavily on whether you want to create moon images with a reference to the surroundings, or superzoom images of the lunar surface in the eclipse, without buildings or landscapes as part of the picture.
6. Camera: In principle, you can photograph with all cameras. For optimal images, however, it is important that you can make full manual settings. Higher-quality compact cameras with a large zoom range are well suited, as are cameras with interchangeable lenses (DSLR/DSLM) such as system and mirrorless cameras with a telephoto lens. For full-frame sensors, you need 500mm telephoto lenses; for APS-C cameras, 300mm telephoto lenses are usually sufficient.

General tips:

• It's best to shoot in RAW format to achieve noise reduction with exposure bracketing and stacking (superimposed images). It's best to expose 40 shots consecutively and then take a single exposure. Stack the 40 shots with AviStack2 or similar and sharpen them with functions like Giotto's Mexican Hit Filter, then adjust the tone curve in Photoshop.
• Exposure bracketing is also suitable because moon brightness and phases vary and depend on the clarity of the atmosphere and the height of the moon above the horizon. Furthermore, as already mentioned, image noise is reduced by stacking the consecutively taken image series, because image noise is a static phenomenon.
• Deactivate auto ISO to manually adjust ISO values. If the ISO value is too high, image noise will be too strong. Moon photography requires ISO values between 100 and 200 and apertures at f/8.
• Manually zoom and focus using Live View; autofocus must then be switched off. In Live View, you can set the exposure via the shutter speed. Focus on the moon and observe how brightly the moon is exposed as you change the shutter speed. Choose a shutter speed that allows the moon's outline to be recognizable. Automatic exposure metering often fails because most of the image is black. Cameras with spot metering offer the advantage of calculating exposure based on the brightness in the active focus field. So, center the moon, choose the aperture, measure the exposure, and then apply it in "M" mode.
• Turn off VR/IS stabilization, as you are shooting with a tripod.
• Stop down the lens by 1-2 third stops for optimal sharpness (also for time-lapses, which can be deflickered during post-processing of the RAW file with LRTimelapse).
• Use a mirror lock-up or self-timer (1 to 2 seconds delay) to prevent camera shake.
• A full moon guarantees an optimal size and consistently more impressive shots.
• Choose a location with room to move. Because if you haven't planned or made planning errors, you may need to move a few meters quickly to get the optimal crop.
• Choose a building, tree, or object that is large to photograph next to the moon. In comparison, you can imagine the size of the moon.
• With telephoto lenses with focal lengths from 200mm to 300mm, you should mainly photograph at the beginning and end of totality, because the umbra is brighter towards the edge and thus exposure times can be reduced.
• During totality, autofocus sensors can hardly focus. Therefore, it is best to focus beforehand and then switch to manual focus on the lens.

Example for photographing a full moon:

To optimally stage the full moon behind the Caravaca de la Cruz in Murcia (Spain), photographer Antonio Carrillo precisely planned the location and image composition beforehand. The result is an exciting picture in which the moon is integrated into the surroundings.

Common problems when photographing:

To document the decrease in brightness during the entry into the penumbra, one should photograph the moon every few minutes. One then notices that with the same exposure time, the brightness decreases (histogram), so that one can adjust the exposure time as the eclipse progresses. Especially shortly before the umbral phase, only a few percent of sunlight reaches the moon at the edge, which darkens before it becomes a blood moon. This is more pronounced in the pictures than it is perceived with the naked eye.

If you want to photograph the partial phase without the areas in the umbra being visible in the picture, the exposure time at f/5.6 and ISO 400 could be about 1/250 to 1/10 second to make the areas of the moon at the umbra's edge clear. Here, too, exposure bracketing and stacking help to find the optimal mean value. If the moon in the umbra is to be clearly depicted, the same exposure times apply as for totality.

Maximum possible exposure time for full-frame and lunar eclipse

These values were determined experimentally and have no mathematical basis.

Source: https://eclipse.astronomie.info/lunar/foto/

Lunar eclipse in Germany until 2025