In just a few short days, Earth will fully consume the distant Moon with its shadow. More specifically, on January 31 st , a large part of the world will be witness to a rare Supermoon Lunar Eclipse. Even better, it will be a blue moon total eclipse ; the first since the Civil War. Put simply, a “blue moon” is the far more poetic name for the second full moon in a single calendar month. We had our first full moon on the first of the year, so call this second one blue, and know it’s super . Oh, it’s a supermoon , too, huh? Well, since it will be a full moon while it’s at its approximate closest distance to the earth of its orbit, then yes, it’s pretty dang super.

The eclipse will last nearly 3.5 hours, which is almost exactly half the length of Bonnie Tyler’s smash hit, “Total Eclipse of the Heart” (the album version, not the single). Coincidence? Not likely. In fact, we suggest either blasting the song from your Spotify, Pandora or Apple Music, or pulling out mom’s old vinyl (the record, of course) and turning it to 11. Lore dictates that you can’t really see an eclipse if you cannot hear it, too.

The beginning of the partial phase kicks off at approximately 3:48 a.m. PT and will conclude at around 7:12 a.m. PT, according to folks in the star-watchin’ industry. Totality is said to last a generous 77 minutes, from 4:51 a.m. PT to 6:08 a.m. PT. Thanks, Moon…or Earth? Or Sun, maybe? Whatever; here’s to natural wonders. Now, let’s get that shot.

Since light will be minimal (ya know, since it’s an eclipse and all), you would need high ISO and long exposure to capture the scene and the landscape, be it with GoPro Fusion or your HERO camera. For Settings and Tips, we checked in with GoPro Engineering Tools Specialist and resident night photo expert Shreenivasan Manievannan. His guiedance is below.

