Your Google Pixel might make it even easier to capture Astrophotography shots

Pixel phones have had an Astrophotography mode for several generations now, allowing users to take great pictures of the stars at night. However, accessing this mode requires you to activate the Night Sight feature first, but that may soon change in a future update. 

The unofficial Google News channel on Telegram discovered it could be possible to manually activate Astrophotography mode on Pixel. According to the channel’s findings, the change will roll out with the release of the Pixel Camera app version 9.5.118. 

To turn on the feature, users will need to go into the Night Sight quick settings menu and enable Astrophotography. Online reports say you can switch modes on the fly by scrolling the slider from “Auto” to “Astro” within Night Sight. It’s indicated by an icon featuring a crescent moon with a plus sign, and it should be a lot easier to enable quickly. 

Pushing the shutter button starts a five-second timer and this brief window allows you to set your phone in a stable location before it begins taking long exposure shots of the night sky. It’ll do this for about four minutes. Processing a final image may take some time, and it reportedly depends on the age of the phone and the “exposure length.”