Get excited to see the beautiful total solar eclipse on Monday, but wait with your smartphone in hand to see the sunshine! It’s quite a common thought that a phone camera is also particularly sensitive to sunlight – causing permanent damage if you don’t handle it properly.
To put it this way, you should never look directly at the sun with your natural eyes because the radiation is potentially harmful, so the same goes for your phone’s camera. Those crisp and lingering distorted camera lenses from the last solar eclipse are still ringing in my ears. (Okay! I think what I meant is that your phone’s camera is facing the sun.)
Luckily, NASA is always there to make sure we don’t experience the dull side of space travel. They also explain that most phones with sensors can suffer UV damage just like any other camera. This is obvious if you bring along a magnifying glass. By using this device the power of the rays coming from the sun becomes three times or four times.
Solution? Let’s wear these eclipse glasses, and make sure they are tested to perfection (meeting ISO 12312-2 standards). When a partial eclipse occurs, you can hold the glasses in front of your phone’s camera while taking a photo. The interplanetary movement was a personal problem for him as he had only one day to travel across the planet. But here’s the twist: I’d like you to remove the filter only during totality, the phase when the Moon is completely covering the Sun. Now it’s your turn to point your camera at the infinitely mesmerizing Corona, the rarest endangered phenomenon!
Phone camera enthusiasts, rejoice! The Google team suggests that you take special care when purchasing a solar filter specifically for photography. Additionally, it enables you to protect your vision by protecting eyes from direct sunlight before totality where it is safe.
Therefore, do not forget to use your phone with normal glasses on this solar eclipse. Your phone (and your eyes) will love you with these lenses, so keep using them!
Thanks NASA 🤓 The word COULD is doing a lot of lifting 😅
— Marques Brownlee (@MKBHD) April 4, 2024
We asked our @NASAHQPhoto team, and the answer is yes, the phone sensor could be damaged just like any other image sensor if it’s pointed directly at the Sun. This is especially true if you’re using any sort of magnifying lens attachment on the phone. You would need to utilize…
— NASA (@NASA) April 4, 2024
I cannot for the life of me find a definitive answer to whether or not pointing a smartphone at the solar eclipse will fry the sensor
Tempted to just take a phone I don't need and point it at the sun for 5 minutes to find out the real answer myself. In the name of science
— Marques Brownlee (@MKBHD) April 4, 2024
