Any telescope · 5 minute read
Photograph the Moon with your phone
Hold the phone to a telescope or binocular eyepiece and turn the brightness down. The craters will surprise you.
Pick the right Moon
A full Moon looks flat, because the Sun is shining straight down on it. A half Moon or a crescent is far more dramatic: along the terminator, the line between lunar day and night, the low sunlight throws long shadows from every crater wall.
Taking the picture
This works through any telescope, through binoculars on a tripod, and through the telescopes on our roof deck, where we keep phone adapters for every eyepiece.
- Use your phone’s main camera at 1x, not the zoom lens.
- Hold the lens a few millimetres from the eyepiece, straight on, until the bright circle fills the screen. An adapter makes this much easier.
- Tap the Moon on the screen to focus, then slide the exposure down until the bright areas show detail instead of white.
- Take a burst of photos and keep the sharpest: the air shimmers, and one in ten will catch a steady moment.
Without a telescope
On a phone alone, use the longest zoom, rest the phone on something solid, and lower the exposure. You will not see craters, but a crescent Moon over a dark landscape makes a lovely picture.
