How to take photos of the moon on Xiaomi: the secrets of night photography

The night sky has always attracted photographers, but the Moon remains the most desirable but hard-to-reach object for shooting on a smartphone. Xiaomi device owners often wonder why the automatic mode gives off a blurred white spot with no texture instead of a detailed Earth satellite.

Fortunately, the brand’s current flagships and even mid-budget models, such as the Xiaomi 13 Ultra series or Redmi Note 12 Pro, feature powerful sensors and advanced software. Understanding the physical principles of the matrix and properly adjusting the exposure manually, make it possible to turn a smartphone into a full-fledged telescope. In this article, we’ll explore how to get around the limitations of automation and get a picture with visible craters.

To start with, you need to realize that just pointing the camera and pressing the down button is not enough here, and you need not only a stable position of the device, but also knowledge of how ISO works and shutter speed in low light conditions, and we will go from choosing the right time to post-processing the file so that you can be proud of the result.

Preparation of equipment and timing

The first and most critical step is choosing the right moment to shoot. Many beginners try to shoot the moon when it is at its zenith, but at this time the contrast between the bright disk and the black sky is too great for a small smartphone sensor. The ideal time is just after sunset or before dawn, when the moon has not yet risen high and the sky shows the details of the landscape.

As far as equipment is concerned, a tripod is absolutely essential, and any, even microscopic hand tremors that you use with long exposure or strong digital zoom will lubricate the image, and if you don't have a professional tripod, you can point your phone against the balcony railing or use a sandbag to fix it.

⚠️ Never use digital zoom again. 10x without optical stabilization, unless the phone is rigidly attached (OIS) They may start to “walk” trying to compensate for non-existent fluctuations, which will spoil the frame.

It's also important to wipe the camera's optics before shooting. Fat spots from your fingers, invisible during the day, turn into strong glare and halos around the light sources at night. Use soft microfiber fabric to avoid scratching on the lens' protective glass.

• 🌙 Wait for the full moon phase or close to it when the relief is best seen.
• 📱 Make sure the battery is at least 40% as a cold night and screen speeds up the battery.
• 🧹 Wash the lens of the main camera and telephoto lens carefully before starting work.
• 🌬️ Check the weather forecast: no clouds and low haze are critical for clarity.

Configure Pro-mode in a standard application

The standard camera app in the MIUI or HyperOS shell has a powerful tool for enthusiasts. Switching to Pro (or More → Pro) gives you complete control over exposure settings. Automation is powerless because it doesn't realize that you want to shoot a bright object against a dark background, rather than illuminate a dark scene.

The first thing you need to do is to manually focus your focus, point your camera at the moon and turn the focus ring until you see a confirmation of focus (usually a green stripe or peak) and often the maximum sharpness is not reached at the extreme position, but a little earlier, so it's important to look at the preview carefully.

The most important parameter is shutter speed. To take a picture of the moon, it must be very short, usually in the range of 1/125 to 1/1000 of a second. If the shutter speed is longer, the moon's motion across the sky (which, with a large zoom, becomes noticeable), will blur the image. ISO sensitivity should be set to the lowest possible, usually 50 or 100 units, to avoid digital noise.

White balance is also best fixed manually. Autobalance may try to "warm" or "cool" moonlight by making it unnaturally yellow or blue. A value of about 4500K-5500K usually gives the most realistic color for the night sky.

Use of telephoto lens and zooming

The quality of the image depends on which lens is used for framing. Xiaomi mid- and high-level smartphones are often equipped with a separate telephoto lens with optical zoom 2x, 3.3x or 5x. Using this module gives a much better result than the digital zoom of the main camera.

When you zoom in with your fingers on the screen, you switch between modules. On some models, like the Xiaomi 13 Pro, optical zoom is activated when you reach 3.3x or 5x, and then digital zoom is turned on. The digital zoom just cuts and stretches the picture, losing the details. So try to stay within the optical range or use hybrid zoom, which works well thanks to AI algorithms.

⚠️ Note: When using zoom, more 30x The quality of the image drops dramatically because of interpolation. 10x-15x And then frame it on the computer.

There's a special Moon Mode that activates automatically when the moon is approached and recognized by artificial intelligence, and it takes multiple frames with different exposures and glues them together to pull out the crater texture, but it often makes the picture too "plastic" and overshaped. For artistic purposes, it's better to use manual mode.

• 🔍 Use optical zoom (1x, 2x, 3x, 5x) digitally stretched.
• 🚫 Avoid using zoom 50x-100x, Unless you have a flagship with a periscopic camera.
• 🤖 Regime. AI "The Moon can over-process a photo, making it unnatural.
• 📐 Horizontal lines on the screen will help to keep the horizon flat when framing.

Comparison of shooting modes: Auto, Pro and AI

To choose the best strategy, you need to clearly understand the difference between the available modes. Automode relies on scripts laid down by developers and often fails in the difficult conditions of contrasting night light. Pro Mode gives full control, but requires knowledge. AI mode tries to guess the scene and apply aggressive post-processing.

The table below compares the characteristics for different approaches to image Earth satellite on Xiaomi devices:

To get the most natural result, which can then be processed qualitatively, professionals choose a manual mode with saving in RAW format. This allows you to save the maximum dynamic range. If you want to quickly share photos on social networks and do not want to mess with the settings, the AI mode can give an acceptable, although not ideal result.

It’s worth noting that Xiaomi’s algorithms have become significantly smarter in recent HyperOS updates to recognize night scenes, but they still tend to overdo the shadows, making the sky gray instead of black.

RAW shooting and post-processing

RAW (or DNG) is a "digital negative" that contains raw data from the matrix. Unlike JPEG, it does not shrink at a loss and stores all the information about color and light. On Xiaomi, you can activate shooting in RAW in the camera settings or directly in the Pro mode interface by selecting the appropriate item in the top panel.

After shooting, the RAW file may look faded and gray. That's okay. It'll require applications like Lightroom Mobile, Snapseed or VSCO to manifest it. In the editor, you can improve contrast, remove lights, and add clarity to highlight the craters' topography.

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Keep the original RAW files separate from the processed JPEGs. After a year, you may find that your processing skills have grown and you will be able to squeeze even more detail out of the old frame.

It's important to not overdo it with sharpness. Excessively increasing the Sharpening parameter will lead to artifacts and "digital porridge" around the disk of the moon. It's better to work carefully with curves and levels, darkening the background and lightening the details of the surface.

• 🎞️ Format RAW borrow 3-5 more space on the disk than JPEG.
• 🎨 Processing RAW It takes time and understanding the basics of color correction.
• 💾 For large-volume storage RAW-Use cloud services or a memory card.
• 🖌️ Local correction in editors allows you to brighten only craters without affecting the background.

Common Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

Even experienced users sometimes make simple mistakes that negate all effort. One of the most common is shooting through a window. The window glass, even perfectly clean, creates glare from internal light sources and reduces the overall sharpness of the image. Always go out into the open.

Another common problem is the use of a flash: a smartphone flash is absolutely useless for shooting celestial bodies, since its light does not reach the moon, but it perfectly illuminates dust on the lens or nearby objects, spoiling the frame. Make sure that the flash is forcibly turned off in the settings.

⚠️ Warning: Don't try to shoot the moon in rain or fog. Moisture in the air scatters light and creates a "milk" effect, making it impossible to get a clear image regardless of your camera settings.

Also worth mentioning is the heat of the smartphone: Pro-mode, with an active screen and an image processor running, can cause the case to heat up. If the phone overheats, the camera can automatically close. Take breaks between frames.

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The secret to success is stability, and a thousand hand-held attempts will do worse than a single shot taken from a phone fixed on a tripod.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)