If you can’t get your hands on a pair of solar eclipse glasses, experts say there are still ways to enjoy the event without issue.
There are also dangerous alternatives, including wearing your regular sunglasses – or even stacking two or three.
“There is no amount of sunglasses people can wear to compensate for the filtering provided by standard ISO filters and eclipse glasses,” said Dr. Jason P. Brinton, an ophthalmologist and medical director of Brinton Vision at St.Louis. .
According to NASA, you also shouldn’t view the eclipse through a camera lens, phone, binoculars, or telescope, even if you wear eclipse glasses. The sun’s rays can burn through the lens and cause serious eye injury.
So what can you use? Here’s what doctors suggest:
How to Make Your Own Anti-Eclipse Glasses at Home
If you don’t have traditional solar eclipse glasses, Brinton said you can also look through No. 14 welder’s goggles (for people who can have access to them) or sheets of aluminized mylar plastic.
Just like with traditional solar eclipse glasses, Brinton said it’s important to make sure the material you’re looking at is fully intact.
“Make sure there are no scratches or damage,” he said.
How to make a pinhole projector to safely observe eclipses
No glasses? Indirect viewing is another way to enjoy the eclipse without damaging your eyes.
Brinton said there are several ways to indirectly view the event, including a homemade pinhole projector. Here’s how to create one:
- Make a small pinhole in a piece of paper
- Facing the sun, holding the paper out so that the sunlight hits it
- Observe the pinhole projection of the sun on the ground (or on a second piece of paper you hold underneath), with it starting in a full circle gradually disappearing
“If you’re in the path of totality, of course it completely disappears.” » said Brinton. “It’s an indirect way of looking at things that’s appropriate.”
How to Make an Eclipse Viewer from a Cereal Box
If you want to make your indirect viewing tool a little more elaborate, you can create an eclipse viewer with a few extra materials around the house. Here’s how:
- Find a small box (popular options are cereal and shoe boxes)
- Cut two openings in the bottom of the box
- Using tape, cover one of the openings with a piece of paper or foil with a small pinhole in it.
- Face away from the sun, allowing light to reach the pinhole
- Looking through the remaining opening toward the interior of the box, watch the sun’s projection change from a full circle to an eclipse.
Ray Petelin
Need a visual? Ray Petelin, CBS Pittsburgh meteorologist demonstrated step-by-step how to create a cereal box pinhole viewer, which you can watch below.
Doctors explain how to make sure your eclipse viewers are safe
“In theory, since you are not looking directly at the sun during the eclipse or partial eclipse, (eclipse viewers) should be safe,” said Dr. Yehia Hashad, an ophthalmologist, retina specialist and chief medical officer of eye health company Bausch + Lomb. “However, having said that, it’s the implementation that worries us sometimes.”
For what? Sometimes people take a quick glance at the sun in order to adjust the box or pinhole in the right direction, he said. This can be especially common among children, who may not understand the consequences of observing the eclipse.
“That’s what makes us sometimes conservative about this method,” Hashad said. “We always worry, unless you oversee the implementation of this, especially with children because they are very vulnerable to these kinds of situations.”
Why do you need a special viewer for the total solar eclipse?
Eye protection during the eclipse is important to prevent eye damage.
“If someone briefly watches the eclipse, even if it’s extremely brief, in some cases it won’t be damaged, but damage can occur even in a fraction of a second in some cases,” Brinton said. “As an ophthalmologist, I have seen patients with so-called eclipse or solar retinopathy.”
Signs and symptoms of eye damage from watching an eclipse include headaches, blurred vision, dark spots, changes in the way you see colors, lines and shapes.
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