A total solar eclipse is one of nature's grandest spectacles, and one that is worth going out of your way to see. Watching and photographing solar eclipses present some unique challenges, however, both logistically and practically. You must travel to the correct location to observe one in its full majesty, and because of the Sun's extreme brightness even when it is mostly concealed by the Moon, eye safety is a vital consideration.
Americans are fortunate in that the U.S. will see two solar eclipses in the coming months: an annular (aka "ring of fire") eclipse on Oct. 14, and then a total solar eclipse—the last to cross the American mainland until 2045—on April 14, 2024. To help you prepare, I will discuss the particulars of these upcoming events, including where to go to see them, and then offer some general information on solar eclipses and what to expect during them, what equipment you might want to bring, and how to safely enjoy viewing and photographing them.
Solar Eclipses 101
A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon, in its orbit around the Earth, passes between the Earth and the Sun, casting its shadow on the Earth. Solar eclipses don't happen every month, however, because the Moon's orbit is inclined by more than 5 degrees to the ecliptic (the plane of Earth's orbit around the Sun). When the new Moon passes near the Sun and is lost in the solar glare, it will usually pass either north or south of the Sun from our vantage point.
NASA map showing the tracks of the October 14, 2023 annular solar eclipse (upper left to lower center) and the April 8, 2024 total solar eclipse (lower left to upper right) across the US mainland, northern Mexico, and southern Canada (Credit: NASA/Scientific Visualization Studio/Michala Garrison; eclipse calculations by Ernie Wright, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center)It is only when a new Moon occurs during the Moon's crossing of the plane of the ecliptic—either from south to north, the so-called ascending node, or from north to south, the descending node—that a solar eclipse can occur. These periods come about every six months. Thus, we have the annular solar eclipse in October and the total solar eclipse in April 2024. In a total solar eclipse, the Moon's apparent size is larger than the Sun's, allowing the Moon to completely cover the solar disk from our perspective. In an annular solar eclipse, the Moon's apparent diameter is smaller than the Sun's, so the dark circle of the Moon appears superimposed on the bright Sun, which surrounds it—the so-called ring of fire.
In April 2023 in Australia, there was a so-called hybrid solar eclipse, which starts as an annular eclipse, becomes total, and then ends as an annular. Sometimes the new Moon occurs far enough away from its passage through a node that only a partial solar eclipse is visible, as happened in October 2022, an event that was best seen from near the "cold pole" in Siberia.
(Credit: Tony Hoffman, text / René Ramos, design)By a fortuitous cosmic coincidence, the Sun's and Moon's disks are nearly identical in their apparent size. Their relative sizes vary somewhat over time, because the Earth's orbit around the Sun, and especially the Moon's orbit around the Earth, are elliptical rather than circular. Thus, you get so-called supermoons, which are full Moons that are slightly larger and brighter than average, when the Moon is closest to Earth in its orbit. Similarly, total solar eclipses are most likely when the new Moon is at its largest, near perigee—its closest point to Earth—and annular eclipses tend to happen when the new Moon is at its smallest, near apogee—its farthest point from us.
Images of the March 20, 2015 total solar eclipse and May 20, 2012 annular solar eclipse, shot to the same scale. Note in particular the difference in the size of the Moon. (Credit: Tony Hoffman)How to Watch the Oct. 14 Annular Solar Eclipse
Many astronomers think of this October's annular solar eclipse as a prelude to next spring's total eclipse. If you did not know that a solar eclipse was taking place, you might never be aware that it happened. But if you are within the path of annularity and looking through a pair of eclipse glasses or a properly filtered telescope, you will get to see the dark Moon gradually obscure the face of our star until it appears superimposed on the larger disk of the Sun, which forms a bright circle around it—the so-called ring of fire. About 90% of the Sun's area will be obscured in this particular event, for up to five minutes along the path of annularity across the American West. It is easy to photograph this event with a properly filtered camera, or simply watch it, provided you have proper eye protection.
The map below shows the path of the Oct. 14 annular solar eclipse across the United States. The purple lines parallel to the eclipse track denote the maximum percentage of the Sun obscured as a partial eclipse for points along each line.
(Credit: Michael Zeiler, GreatAmericanEclipse.com)At 9:13 a.m. Pacific time on the morning of Oct. 14, the Moon's shadow—after tracking across part of the north Pacific—will make landfall in south-central Oregon, with Eugene and the lower Willamette Valley lying within the path of annularity (where the dark Moon will appear surrounded by the ring of the sun). The shadow moves southeastward, traversing a slim corner of northeastern California and a much tinier sliver of Idaho, crossing northern Nevada—including the towns of Winnemucca and Elko—and south-central Utah, where it will cross Capitol Reef National Park, Goblin Valley State Park, and part of Canyonlands National Park, along with Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, Glen Canyon, and Monument Valley.
2012 annular eclipse image photographed from Arizona, with a camera equipped with a white-light filter. In that eclipse, about 87% of the sun's area was obscured, a little less than will be the case in the 2023 eclipse. (Credit: Tony Hoffman)Still racing southeastward, the Moon's shadow traverses the Four Corners region, passing over Mesa Verde and Chaco Canyon. Albuquerque, on the eclipse's centerline, will experience nearly 5 minutes of annularity, while Santa Fe, near the path's northern edge, will see a little less than 3 minutes. Roswell lies near the centerline, as does Odessa, Texas. San Antonio will lie beneath the "ring of fire" for nearly four minutes, and Corpus Christi for five minutes.
Graph of mean October cloud cover (2000-2018) along the Oct. 14 annular eclipse track, acquired during the satellite pass at 10:30 a.m. local time along the centerline of the eclipse track. Units are fractional sky cover, which can be interpreted as percent cloud cover. (Credit: Jay Anderson, www.eclipsophile.com)Weather prospects for the event seem very good. While there is often coastal cloudiness in Oregon, once you get east of the Cascades the outlook improves considerably. From central Oregon through most of Texas, the mean historical cloud cover for the date and time of the eclipse for any given location stays below 50%, and from Monument Valley through New Mexico it hovers around 30%. Keep in mind, though, that good weather prospects for your site based on historical data doesn't ensure clear skies on eclipse day. As they say in the financial world, past performance doesn't guarantee future results.
The Moon's shadow then crosses the Gulf of Mexico before traversing the Yucatan peninsula, parts of Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, and Brazil, before the eclipse ends at sunset in the South Atlantic.
Although it is much easier to find accommodations within the eclipse path for an annular rather than a total eclipse, it still could be a challenge at this late juncture. Big cities may be your best bet, because of their sheer number of hotel rooms. The largest cities in the path of annularity are San Antonio, Albuquerque, and Corpus Christi. For Albuquerque, the eclipse falls on the second and last weekend of the city's annual Balloon Fiesta, which is a wonderful event to witness, though it will cut into the number of available hotel rooms. I will be observing the event from Utah, staying outside the path of annularity but driving down into it on the morning of the eclipse.
How to Watch the April 8, 2024 Total Solar Eclipse
During the second total solar eclipse to cross the United States mainland this century, and the last until 2045, the umbra—the darkest part of the Moon's shadow, within which the Moon totally obscures the Sun's bright face—traces a 115-mile-wide track across Mexico, the central and northeastern United States, Quebec, and the Canadian maritime provinces. It has the longest duration of totality for land-based observers—nearly four and a half minutes near its peak in Mexico—of any total solar eclipse since 2010. The rest of North America except for Alaska and a small sliver of the Yukon will see a partial solar eclipse, but you do want to be in the path of totality if at all possible.
2019 partial phase solar eclipse in Argentina (Credit: Tony Hoffman)The map below shows the path of the April 8 total solar eclipse across the United States. The yellow lines parallel to the path of totality denote the maximum percentage of the Sun obscured as a partial eclipse, and the purple lines that intersect the path of totality show the time of maximum eclipse at 5-minute intervals.
(Credit: Michael Zeiler, GreatAmericanEclipse.com)The eclipse begins at dawn on April 8 in the vicinity of the Cook Islands in the South Pacific. The Moon's shadow tracks across about 4,000 miles of open ocean before finally making landfall in the state of Sinaloa on the west coast of Mexico; the port of Mazatlán, near the centerline, will experience 4 minutes and 10 seconds of totality. From there, the path of totality tracks northeastward through the Mexican states of Durango and Coahuila, with the eclipse's maximum duration of 4 minutes and 28 seconds occurring in Durango, just southwest of the city of Torreon. Based on average April cloud cover, Torreon also has the best weather prospects along the entire eclipse track over land, with an average April cloud cover of just 22%.
Totality in 2019 from Argentina (Credit: Tony Hoffman)The farther the eclipse tracks to the northeast, the more the average April cloud cover percentage increases. At Zaragoza in Coahuila, on the eclipse centerline about 30 miles from the Texas border, cloud cover is already over 40%, while in Uvalde, 40 miles into Texas, the average cloud cover is about 50% and the duration of totality about 4 minutes, 15 seconds.
A graph of April cloud amounts along the centerline as measured from the Aqua spacecraft at approximately 1:30 p.m. local time from 2000 to 2020. Stations are plotted according to their longitude, even though they often do not lie on the centerline. Data source: NASA. (Credit: Jay Anderson, www.eclipsophile.com)Downtown San Antonio lies just outside of the path of totality and will experience a very deep partial eclipse, but the umbral shadow will pass over the city's northwestern neighborhoods and suburbs. Austin lies near the edge of the eclipse track and will see just under 2 minutes of totality. In Waco, totality will last 4 minutes,15 seconds. Dallas will see 3 minutes, 45 seconds of totality, and average April cloud cover has increased to 55%. (The current El Niño weather pattern may have some beneficial effect along this part of the eclipse path, somewhat increasing the chances of clear skies.)
Solar eclipse diamond ring in Argentina, 2019 (Credit: Tony Hoffman)The Moon's shadow then crosses Oklahoma and Arkansas, with Little Rock getting about 2 minutes of totality. Carbondale, Illinois, in the path of totality for the second time in seven years, will spend 4 minutes under the umbral shadow, with average cloud cover up to more than 60%. Indianapolis, Cleveland, Buffalo, and Rochester will each get about 3 minutes, 45 seconds of totality, and Burlington, Vermont about 3 minutes, 15 seconds. Montreal lies just within the northern edge of the path of totality and will see about a minute of darkness. Average April cloud cover for Quebec, Maine, and New Brunswick, Canada is about 80%. The Moon's shadow then traverses the Gulf of St. Lawrence and crosses Newfoundland, with Gander getting just over 2 minutes of totality but with an average of nearly 85% cloud cover. The path of totality then tracks across the North Atlantic, ending at sunset about 1,000 miles off the northwestern tip of Spain.
Even at this writing, more than 7 months before eclipse day, you'd be hard pressed to find accommodations within the path of totality. Prices on available rooms may be jacked up to several times their normal rate. You could stay outside the path of totality and drive towards the centerline the day of the eclipse, but keep in mind—if the 2017 American solar eclipse is any example—that many other eclipse-goers will be doing the same thing and the roads could get very congested. If you have friends who live within the path of totality, you might want to see if they are willing to put you up.
A more expensive but pleasant option is to book a place on a tour with one of the agencies that specialize in eclipse travel. I have been to four total solar eclipses as a participant in such tours. They take care of all the travel (apart from your airfare to and from the place where the tour starts), accommodations, and itinerary; they generally last a week or more, and include visits to area and local attractions, and the services of one or more astronomers who are experts on eclipses. They normally give a talk the night before the eclipse, and on eclipse day can give you guidance on the timing of the different stages of the eclipse as well as tips on eye safety.
Among the better known travel agencies that offer or specialize in eclipse tours are TravelQuest International (with whom I have traveled twice); Ring of Fire Expeditions, which is led by Paul D. Maley, who has been to more than 80 solar eclipses; Eclipse Traveler; Astro Trails, which has been organizing astronomy-related tours since 1979; and Sirius Travel. There are also some capable smaller companies, though finding them may take some research. I was on a pleasant and successful eclipse tour to South America in 2019 with AstroSafari, with assistance from Black Sun Expeditions.
Eye Safety Is Paramount
A solar eclipse, particularly a total one, is an amazing phenomenon and well worth seeing at least once in your life. However, solar eclipses can be tricky to safely view and photograph because of the Sun's extreme brightness, even when it is mostly obscured, and proper eye protection is essential to safely enjoy the spectacle. During a total solar eclipse, it is only safe to look at the event without eye protection during totality (the period during which the Moon's disk completely covers the Sun's bright face), and it is never safe to look at the Sun without a proper filter during an annular or partial solar eclipse, or during the partial phases of a total solar eclipse.
When the sun becomes more than about 90% obscured, the light may start to seem a bit dimmer, but even the remaining sunlight is much too strong to look at without eclipse glasses. Never stare at the sun without eye protection. Never look at the sun through an unfiltered telescope or binoculars or a camera's optical viewfinder except when it is totally eclipsed—doing so is a recipe for permanent eye damage or blindness. Ensure that children (and adults) in your group keep their eyes protected when looking at the sun, except during totality.
But do keep some perspective. If someone in your group does take a very brief look at the sun—as most people do at some point in their lifetimes, accidentally or otherwise—don't panic: It's unlikely to cause permanent damage. (Staring at the sun for any length of time is a different and far more dangerous matter.)
As an 11-year-old, at my first solar eclipse in 1970, I couldn't resist taking a couple of furtive glances at the approximately 95% obscured crescent sun. After the eclipse, I had a headache, and for the next day or so, I was panicked that I would become blinded for life by the "eclipse rays" I had taken in. I had no one to put this into perspective and was afraid to tell my parents what I had done. As it turned out, I had no actual visual symptoms or problems from this incident—I had just let fear and lack of information get the best of me.
If you're with a group led by an astronomer who's experienced with eclipses, they will tell you when it is safe to take your glasses off and when you should put them back on. If you're on your own, an app such as Solar Eclipse Timer can serve the same purpose, giving you auditory instructions on when it is or isn't safe to look.
What to Expect When You're Eclipsing
Whether an eclipse is partial, total, or annular, it goes through the same sorts of phases, at least near the beginning and end, as the moon's disk begins its passage across the sun's face and then later when it recedes. At the onset of the eclipse (known as "first contact" or "C1" for total or annular eclipses), the edge (limb) of the sun appears to have a small nibble taken out of it as the moon's shadow starts its journey across the solar disk. The nibble becomes a bite (a phase I call Pac-Man Sun) as the moon progressively covers the sun, until it starts to assume a crescent appearance.
"Pac-Man Sun," Svalbard, 2015 (Credit: Tony Hoffman)If you are on or near the path of totality or annularity, the sun eventually takes on the form of a rapidly thinning crescent. Particularly in the case of a total eclipse, changes to the landscape will become apparent. Ever so slowly at first, the sky begins to visibly darken, the light softens, and birds fly home to roost.
Birds flying during an eclipse in China, 2009 (Credit: Tony Hoffman)In the ring of fire stage of the 2023 annular eclipse, the Moon will cover about 90% of the Sun's area for those observing it from within the path of annularity. The reduction in light on the landscape and in the sky will be much more subtle than in the buildup to a total eclipse. You'll still absolutely need to keep your eyes protected, as even 10% of the sun's light is far too bright to safely view, and could damage your eyes or blind you if you stare at it.
Totality Approaches
If the weather cooperates, in the minutes or so before totality, the light on the landscape will soften and the scene will steadily grow darker. In the minute before totality, you may see a rippling effect known as shadow bands on the ground before you. It is easier to see if you place a white sheet or poster board on the ground in the sunward direction. The sky will precipitously darken, and any bright planets may become visible. After a final flourish known as the diamond ring, in which a bright gleam of sunlight shines through valleys on the Moon's limb only to be broken into a string of smaller bright spots called Baily's beads, totality (aka second contact) ensues, and it is safe to take off your glasses. You will see the white glow of the solar corona—the Sun's hot yet tenuous atmosphere—surrounding the Moon's disk, which is utterly black as if a hole had been punched in the sky, and the sky will take on the appearance of deep twilight. The duration of totality is yours to enjoy; you will take in one of the most profound phenomena nature has to offer.
The image below, by eclipse observer and photographer Robert Slobins, is processed to be as close as possible to the visual appearance of the solar corona. In his words, "this is a composite of 45 images of different exposure values (times) from a Nikon D800E and 400mm lens. Each of these images is added to a stack, creating the composite. Then additional processing is used to bring out the details." At the 8 o'clock position, you can see Regulus, the brightest star in Leo.
Composite of 45 images processed to render the solar corona on Aug. 21, 2017 in Wyoming (Credit: Robert Slobins)The end of totality is marked by a gradual brightening of one limb of the Sun and the surrounding sky—be sure to stash your binoculars and put the filter back on your telescope as soon as you notice this!—followed by another brief appearance of Baily's beads and then the second diamond ring. If you choose to view the diamond ring, do so very briefly, no longer than it takes you to say "diamond ring." (All you need is a brief look; the memory of it will last a lifetime.) Then don your eclipse glasses once more, as the Sun will brighten very quickly after that. Do take some pictures of the diamond ring; it is very photogenic. You can start with an exposure of about 1/50 second, but quickly reduce the exposure time as the scene brightens; let the image on your LCD be a guide. (See the section on eclipse photography below.)
Eclipse observers in Svalbard, Norway in 2015 (Credit: Tony Hoffman)Professional photographer Stan Honda, who was with me and a group from TravelQuest International on an icy plain in the arctic archipelago of Svalbard to view and shoot the March 2015 total solar eclipse, took the wide-angle shot you see below, showing the diamond ring at the end of totality (aka third contact or C3), as well as the crowd in the foreground. It was featured the following day as NASA's astronomy picture of the day.
Wide-field photo of the diamond ring at third contact in Svalbard, Norway in 2015 (Credit: Stan Honda)Stan took the photo with a tripod-mounted Nikon D800 with a 24mm lens at f/8, a 1/8 second exposure at ISO 400. I asked him how he achieved the "starburst effect," with what appear to be rays emanating from the Sun. He replied, "On a wide angle lens, as soon as you start stopping down from the widest aperture, you start getting the diffraction/starburst. So at f/8, it's pretty pronounced. This wasn't planned, but it turned out nicely in the photo."
Just after the end of totality, if you look in the direction along the eclipse path in which the Moon's shadow is moving—check your map of the eclipse track in advance; for the 2024 total eclipse in the United States, it will be to the northeast—you may be able to see the Moon's shadow as it quickly recedes. The shadow shows best under partly cloudy rather than clear conditions. The iPhone panorama below, which I took just after totality ended in 2017, shows the Moon's shadow, racing to the southeast, projected onto clouds above the Wessels Living History Farm in York, Nebraska. At the horizon, you see part of the effect sometimes called the 360-degree sunset (or sunrise).
iPhone panorama taken just after totality in 2017 from York, Nebraska (Credit: Tony Hoffman)You should already have your eclipse glasses on, and will need to put the solar filter back on your camera's lens when the diamond ring is over. The paper-thin crescent of sunlight will thicken as the Moon's disk slowly slides off the face of the Sun, and you will see the same phases as before totality, except in reverse, until the Moon totally slides off the Sun's face (at fourth contact, or C4).
You Don't Have to Photograph the Eclipse
Particularly if you are viewing your first total solar eclipse, you may decide you don't want to photograph it at all. A good case can be made for eschewing photography and simply taking totality in with your eyes. A total solar eclipse is a profound—in some cases life-changing—experience, and it's important to give yourself the time to take in this spectacle undistracted. Any time you spend with a camera may take you away from the visual experience. If you experience any camera problems, you're probably best off scuttling your attempt at photography. Don't do what I did in my second eclipse in Kenya, where I spent the precious seconds of an all-too-brief totality trying to get my camera's balky autofocus to engage!
2012 annular (ring of fire) eclipse as seen through a personal solar telescope (Credit: Tony Hoffman)Gearlog: Necessary and Optional Equipment
You will need eclipse glasses or an eclipse viewer to safely view the Sun during the eclipse's partial phases. You can also view an image of the partially eclipsed Sun as a bright circle showing its phase, with a pinhole projector. If you want to photograph the event, you'll want a camera, a solar filter, and in most cases a tripod.
Trying out eclipse viewers and glasses in preparation for the 2017 solar eclipse (Credit: Tony Hoffman)Eclipse Glasses/Viewers
A popular and inexpensive way to safely view the partially eclipsed sun is through so-called eclipse glasses. They typically consist of solar filters made from thin black polymer, one for each eye, secured in a cardboard frame similar to an eyeglass frame, with "arms" that hook over each ear. Note that when wearing eclipse glasses, you can't see anything except the Sun, so you can't walk around with them on.
Six pairs of eclipse glasses (Credit: Tony Hoffman)An alternative is a handheld eclipse viewer, a device similar in form to a large index card, in which a strip of solar-filter material is sandwiched between two sheets of cardboard with a horizontal slit cut into each piece of cardboard. They are sometimes called solar viewers, which is perhaps a better name because they can also be used to safely view the uneclipsed Sun. (On rare occasions, you can use them to see sunspots large enough to be visible without magnification--as is also the case with eclipse glasses.) Some eclipse viewers come with a lanyard so they hang around your neck when you're not using them.
An eclipse viewer, or solar viewer (Credit: Tony Hoffman)Although most eclipse glasses and viewers are safe for their intended purpose, be sure the ones you get are certified by the International Standards Organization (ISO) as meeting ISO 12312-2. (Just because an ad claims that an eclipse product is ISO-certified doesn't mean that it is. A lot of fly-by-night companies hawked their products on online retailers in the buildup to the 2017 total eclipse, some claiming nonexistent certifications—I bought one such eclipse viewer that definitely was not safe. When I tried to return it, the company had disappeared from the store.) Fortunately, safe eclipse glasses are easy enough to find. Among the reliable brands are Rainbow Symphony and American Paper Optics; they are available through online retailers and astronomy organizations. They are often handed out at eclipse viewing events, but it's best to get at least one pair in advance.
Before using a pair of eclipse glasses, even a new one, be careful that it is not scratched or damaged. If its polymer film is breached by so much as a small scratch or hole, it is dangerous to use. This is a particular concern if you are hoping to "recycle" a pair of glasses used at a previous eclipse. Eclipse glasses, made of thin cardboard, are liable to become bent or creased with use. I make a point of using a fresh pair for each eclipse I see.
Pinhole Camera
For my first solar eclipse, on March 7, 1970, I had no access to eclipse glasses or filters, so I used a pinhole viewer (or pinhole camera) instead. (My colleague Chandra Steele has a great tutorial on how to build one.) Mine consisted simply of two sheets of paper, one with a hole from a pin or thumbtack poked in it. I held the piece of paper with the hole in it with its flat side facing the Sun, and held the second sheet a foot or so behind it. When sunlight passes through the hole, it projects an image of the Sun's disk onto the sheet behind it. I was thus able to safely (except for my few furtive glances at the thin solar crescent, which I described in the section on eye safety above) watch the Sun as it shrank down to a thin crescent as the Moon passed in front of it.
Nature also provides its own pinhole viewers. If you stand by a sunlit tree during the partial phases of a solar eclipse, light filtering through gaps or holes in the leaves or branches will project tiny, bright images of the Sun in whatever eclipse phase it happens to be. You can also use any implement with small holes in it such as a colander (cooking strainer) to project solar images. Even a Saltine cracker, with its grid of tiny holes, will do!
Top: Solar filters from Thousand Oaks Optical and Daystar. Bottom: Eclipse glasses and eclipse viewer. (Credit: Tony Hoffman)Solar Filters
Except for the brief period of totality, if you plan to photograph a solar eclipse or view the event through a conventional telescope or binoculars, you will need a solar filter to fit in front of your camera's lens or the front of your scope, between its lens or mirror and the Sun. You can buy either complete filters, in cells fitted to the outside diameter of your lens, of sheets of filter material, which you can cut to fit your lens and design your own housing for. Make sure that the filter completely covers your lens, and avoid using a filter intended solely for photography for visual use, as that can be dangerous to your eyes. Some filters, such as Thousand Oaks Optical's SolarLite and Silver-Black Polymer Films, Baader Planetarium AstroSolar Safety Film, and Daystar Filters' Universal Lens Filter, can be used with both cameras and for visual use.
A solar filter designed to be placed over the front of a telescope's objective lens. Similar filters are available for use with cameras. (Credit: Tony Hoffman)The aforementioned filters are so-called white-light filters, which primarily show sunspots, planetary transits (rare as they are), and the changing phases of a solar eclipse up until, and after, totality. Hydrogen-alpha filters are much more expensive, and can show a wealth of solar detail such as sunspots, filaments, and prominences. Companies such as Lunt Solar Systems offer hydrogen-alpha filters.
Be sure to order any solar filters you need well in advance of the eclipse you need them for, as they tend to sell out quickly, particularly before a total solar eclipse.
Camera
The good news is that you don't necessarily need a fancy camera to get decent eclipse shots. Most any camera will do, although using a mirrorless camera, DSLR, or a compact camera with a range of manual settings is to your advantage. For photographing solar eclipses, I have used a variety of cameras over the years, including mirrorless models (Canon Rebel XTi, Sony A7r, Samsung NX300), compact cameras such as the Canon PowerShot SD990 IS and Sony DSC-RX100 Mark II, and iPhones. Most of my eclipse photography has been close-up shots using a mirrorless camera with a zoom lens set to 200mm or 300mm, but I've also gotten great shots from compact cameras and even iPhones.
Photo gear used during the 2017 total solar eclipse (Credit: Tony Hoffman)With a mirrorless camera or DSLR, you can get closeups of the solar corona, prominences, and chromosphere (inner atmosphere), or wide-field shots if you prefer. Compact cameras are particularly good for wide-field eclipse shots, such the image at the top of this story, which I took in Argentina in 2019. I have used my iPhone for shooting solar eclipse panoramas, videos, and snapshots of the landscape and other eclipse viewers.
Once again though, if you use multiple cameras, you add to the complexity of your workflow, which can take away from ability to watch the eclipse. It is possible to automate elements of your eclipse photography, using software such as Solar Eclipse Maestro (for macOS), which can control one or more cameras.
Tripod/Tracking Mount
You will also want a portable tripod. Be sure it's sturdy enough to hold the weight of your camera if you're using a mirrorless camera or DSLR. If you plan to shoot close-ups of the Sun, you might want to add an accessory known as a tracking mount or star tracker, which screws into the top of a tripod and in turn accommodates a camera. These tracking mounts are motorized, and you can set them to follow the motion of the Sun, Moon, or stars. They are meant to be aligned with the north celestial pole (the star Polaris) for viewers in the northern hemisphere, but even a rough alignment towards the north in daytime will let you keep the Sun in the camera's field of view for much longer than if the camera were mounted directly on the tripod. Popular tracking mounts include the Sky Watcher Star Adventurer and iOptron Skytracker Pro; Sky-Watcher Star Adventurer Mini is a good tracking mount for smaller cameras.
Left: The author with eclipse gear, Grand Canyon, 2012; Right: Cassiopeia the cat inspecting his personal solar telescope (Credit: (l) Geoffrey Worssam; (r) Tony Hoffman)Solar Telescope
Above is a shot of me during the annular ("ring of fire") solar eclipse on the south rim of Grand Canyon on May 22, 2012, which I viewed under cloudless desert skies with my great friend Geoffrey and his family. The telescope to my left is a Coronado personal solar telescope (PST), which uses a special filter that only lets through a specific wavelength of light (at the hydrogen alpha spectral line), letting observers see details like flares, prominences, and filaments that are normally unobservable. Such a telescope is also good for watching the partial phases of a solar eclipse, but cannot be used for observing the night sky. The PST costs $850, while similar Lunt Solar Systems dedicated solar telescopes start at $750.
Photo from 2012 annular solar eclipse, seen through a personal solar telescope, which uses a hydrogen-alpha filter. This image shows several sunspots, including a small dark one near the top, a filament (the dark line towards the lower right), and a prominence, which extends below the Sun's limb at lower right. (Credit: Tony Hoffman)If the Weather Doesn't Cooperate....
Even if there's a high probability of clear skies at your chosen eclipse-viewing location (based on weather history from previous years for the eclipse's date and time), there is no guarantee of clear skies on eclipse day, and you may or may not be able to relocate to a place with better weather prospects in time. But even if your eclipse is completely or mostly eclipsed by clouds, you may still be able to get some memorable images.
On July 22, 2009 I stood on a beach in Jinshanwei, China, in the path of totality for the first time. Although the weather forecast for eclipse day was rather dismal, glimpses of the Sun through clouds in the eclipse's early stages made the group I was with hopeful that we might see something of totality, but it was not to be.
Eclipse glasses for the 2009 China total solar eclipse (Credit: Tony Hoffman)A common belief in ancient China was that a solar eclipse was caused by a celestial dragon trying to eat the Sun. Our Sun-devourer that day, however, was primarily meteorological. We got our final view of the shrinking crescent Sun foundering in the thickening clouds less than 10 minutes before totality. During the nearly 6 minutes of totality at our location, the world turned dark as night, with no hint of the eclipsed Sun through the blackness. Within about 20 minutes after the end of totality it was pouring rain. I felt a burning sensation in my eyes; it must have been acid rain. I made the best of this inauspicious start to my eclipse-chasing career by getting some dramatic photos of the thin crescent Sun caught in the growing mass of clouds, such as the shot below and the shot of the eclipse bird that appears earlier in this article. The clouds acted as a natural solar filter, which was a good thing because otherwise I would have only been able to take photos at totality as I did not have a solar filter for my camera.
Partially eclipsed Sun and clouds, Jinshanwei, China, 2009 (Credit: Tony Hoffman)At my second total solar eclipse, for which I had traveled with a group to northern Kenya, we also ran into weather issues. Despite an 80% chance of clear skies at our location, shortly after the partial phases began, a sandstorm followed by rain hit our location. We ended up taking a van to the airstrip and taking to the air in the plane we had flown in on in an attempt to fly above the clouds to see the brief (approximately 8 seconds) period of totality. Although I got no pictures of totality, after we landed and drove back to our camp, I noticed that the setting Sun was emerging below a cloud deck that hung just above the horizon. I took a series of images of the Sun, still partially eclipsed, setting behind the hills beyond Lake Turkana. The Sun was low enough in the sky, and conditions were such, that I took the image below without a solar filter.
Partially eclipsed Sun setting beyond Lake Turkana, Kenya in 2013 (Credit: Tony Hoffman)If your weather on eclipse day is gloomy, and you don't have the luxury of flying above the clouds or driving to a potentially clearer spot, you can still take some memorable shots. If you're in the path of totality, the sky and landscape will still dramatically darken, and people and animals will be affected by the changing light. Give yourself the freedom to shoot whatever strikes your fancy, even if it may not be the experience that you were counting on. I've been at least partly clouded out at several eclipses, but I've shot some of my favorite solar eclipse photos under less-than-ideal conditions.
Photo Tips and Tricks
Mirrorless Camera Pointers
For most of the eclipses I've photographed, I have used a mirrorless camera with a zoom lens set to 200mm or 300mm and a white-light solar filter. As the eclipse starts, when the full solar disk is visible, I've set the ISO for 400 or 800, the aperture at about f/8, and the exposure time at 1/500 second or shorter. You don't want to set the aperture too wide, or it may be tricky to maintain focus. I've manually focused my camera, either on a sunspot, or (with the filter taken off) some distant terrestrial object, and then locked the focus. There are charts listing suggested exposure times available online that are helpful, but I've generally just used the brightness of the solar image in my LCD as a guide. (It's a good idea to take some practice shots of the Sun through your filter well in advance of the eclipse, experiment with the settings, and see what works best for you.)
As the eclipse progresses to a point where about half the Sun is covered, you should double the exposure time, and continue to incrementally increase it as the solar crescent thins. Just before totality begins, you will want to remove the solar filter from your lens. (Hopefully you will have somebody, or at least an app, to tell you when to do this.) For the diamond ring, you will want to set exposure time to about 1/50 second. During totality, you might want to take a series of exposures of varying lengths. Really short exposures (1/500 or 1/250 second) will capture prominences, pinkish tongues or loops of plasma ejected from the Sun, while slightly longer exposures (from about 1/125 to 1/8 second) will show the inner corona, the Sun's tenuous, very hot atmosphere, and even longer exposures (up to several seconds), will reveal the outer corona. Later, you could combine these shots to form an HDR image like the one by Robert Slobins from the 2017 eclipse in the Totality section above, or else process them as individual images. After the second diamond ring that marks the end of totality, you will need to put the solar filter back on your camera. You can continue shooting the partial eclipse, this time decreasing your exposure length as more and more of the Sun is revealed until the eclipse is over.
Processing Your Eclipse Image Trove
If the weather and your equipment cooperate, at the end of eclipse day, you may have anywhere from a handful to a large folder (or multiple folders, if you use more than one camera) of images. Processing them can range anywhere from simple tweaks like cropping, resizing, brightness and contrast adjustments to combining multiple frames to form an HDR or composite image. I use Adobe Photoshop for the vast majority of my eclipse photo editing, but other programs should do just as well. Here are just a few examples of processing images that I've tried.
In my 2019 eclipse images taken with my Sony A7r, I found that my camera's white balance must have been off (it should have been set for daylight, for obvious reasons), giving the corona a greenish cast, as in the left-hand image below. There are several ways to adjust white balance in Photoshop and similar programs; I used Color Balance, adjusting sliders for shadows, mid-tones, and highlights, seeking to make the corona look white, as it does to my eye during an eclipse, and reduced the saturation somewhat. The result is the right-hand image.
Left: Image as shot. Right: Image with white balance adjusted (Credit: Tony Hoffman)Processing your eclipse images may also give you a chance to have fun and be creative. I was struck by the symmetry of the corona in my close-up images of totality in 2019, and how the corona's ionized plasma seemed to follow the Sun's magnetic field lines. I took one of my images, created five versions of it—each with slightly different settings—in Adobe Lightroom, combined them in the Photomatix HDR program into a single image, which I imported into Photoshop. From there I tweaked the contrast, converted it to monochrome, and also made a positive version of the image, in an attempt to highlight this aspect of the coronal structure, and I'm very satisfied with the result (below).
(Credit: Tony Hoffman)At the same eclipse, I had taken four panoramic shots with my iPhone. These involved holding the phone steady relative to the horizon as I slowly turned, panning through more than 180 degrees. Each panorama took about 10 seconds. In retrospect, if I had taken just one or two, it would have given me more time to enjoy simply looking at the eclipse, but the sequence of four nicely shows the changing orientation of the Moon's shadow relative to the foreground (the Andes mountains) as the eclipse progressed, as well as depicting the spectacle of the solar corona surrounding the blackness of the Moon's tiny disk. I cropped this single frame down to a reasonable width and adjusted the brightness and contrast before I was happy with it.
Cropped version of an iPhone panorama from 2019 in Argentina showing the eclipsed Sun above the Andes, as well as the Moon's shadow. (Credit: Tony Hoffman)Below is a composite series of images that I took of the 2015 total solar eclipse from the island of Spitsbergen in the arctic archipelago of Svalbard. Honda later showed me and other classmates at an astrophotography workshop put on by the Amateur Astronomers Association of New York how to create such a composite in Photoshop, by importing each individual image as a separate layer, positioning them and tweaking them using the Free Transform function, and then flattening the "layer cake" into a single image. Thanks, Stan!
Six-image composite of the 2015 solar eclipse from Svalbard, Norway, from soon after first contact (the start of the eclipse) until totality. The total timespan between the first and last image is about an hour. (Credit: Tony Hoffman)A World Full of Solar Eclipses
I hope this guide helps whet your appetite for observing and photographing solar eclipses, and that you get a chance to see at least one of the upcoming eclipses. Although the April 8, 2024 total solar eclipse will be the last to cross the U.S. mainland for more than 20 years, one is visible from somewhere on Earth every 18 months or so. You may have to travel a good distance to see most of them, but if you have the means and the motivation, it's well worth the effort.
On Aug. 12, 2026, parts of Greenland, Iceland, and Spain will lie beneath the Moon's shadow, with the island of Mallorca seeing about a minute and a half of totality just before sunset. Aug. 2, 2027 is the date of the the great North African total solar eclipse, which will have the longest duration of totality remaining in the twenty-first century, up to 6 minutes, 20 seconds for Luxor and the Valley of Kings in Egypt. Tangier will see nearly 5 minutes of totality, and Gibraltar four and a half minutes. In Saudi Arabia, Jeddah will spend 6 minutes beneath the umbral shadow, and Mecca more than 5 minutes.
Total solar eclipses will cross Australia in both 2028 (Sydney will experience nearly 4 minutes of totality) and 2030, while the umbral shadow will cross northwestern Alaska in 2033, northern Africa in 2034, Japan, North Korea, and China in 2035. The decade will close out with two more total eclipses for Australia in 2037 and 2038—with New Zealand also experiencing totality in the latter event—and one in Antarctica in 2039. Eclipse observer Xavier Jubier offers interactive maps showing the eclipse tracks and circumstances for all these events, as well as for total, annular, partial, and hybrid solar eclipses going as far back as 1955.
Someday, there will be no more total solar eclipses. Each year, the Moon recedes ever so slightly, by about an inch and a half, from Earth. Over time, this distance adds up, until at last the Moon's disk will no longer completely cover the Sun, and the golden age of solar eclipses for our planet will end. Fortunately, we needn't fret about this eventuality, as it won't happen for more than a billion years. Instead, let us be grateful for the exceptional circumstances that make these wondrous events possible, and enjoy all the more those that we are able to see.
