Tag: mars

Patience wins out.

I packed the tripod for our trip to the coast.  We went to the beach both mornings, while we were in Port Aransas, to once again try to capture a shot of Mercury, Mars, Jupiter and Venus together.

Yesterday clouded up just before Mercury rose.  This morning the clouds threatened again, but danced between the planets.   I took this shot looking above the south jetty on the Port Aransas end of Mustang Island.  The lowest in this shot is Mercury, just above the seeping pink glow of dawn.  Above it is the pair of reddish, smaller Mars just below and to the left of larger Jupiter.  And then above them, and the brightest, Venus.  The other stars above and to the left of the ecliptic are stars in the constellation Leo.

The red and green lights on the horizon are some of the channel markers that guide the ships through the channel between the jetties.

IMG_5017

Three out of four!

I used a tripod this morning with a long exposure and captured Venus (the brightest), then Mars (smallest, reddish), and Jupiter (just below Mars) together.  If I zoom all the way in, I like to think I can also identify a dot washed out by the dawn near the tree tops that could be Mercury.   If that’s true, I guess I technically have 5 planets in the same frame, if you count Earth.  🙂

Factoid of the day:  the origin of the word “Thursday” is “Thor’s Day.”  Thor is the Greek god of thunder, also known as the Roman god Jupiter.  (according to wikipedia, anyway).

Happy Thursday!IMG_4875

Jul 14, 2010

The moon, planets & stars, oh my!

You might want to go into a dark room to see this image.   I follow an online sky-watching site called Sky & Telescope.  Each week it points out notable things in the night sky to watch out for.   This week there is a pretty cool lining up of Mercury, Venus, Mars and Saturn, alongside the crescent moon.

So, I went out tonight on a mission to try to capture a picture of this glorious event.  I had limited success.  Mercury was not visible.  I was able to see the others.   Here is the best image I have.   Not great, but kind of cool if you think about what you’re seeing.    If you look diagonally  from top left down to bottom right you can see:  Saturn, then Mars, then Venus (brightest star to the right of the crescent moon) then below Venus to the right is Regulus.

Pretty cool, eh?!

If you look on the right side between Saturn and Mars, you’ll see the star Denebola, which is part of the constellation Leo.

This is the diagram from Sky & Telescope, if it helps.

I’m starting to look at fancy-dancy cameras now.   Not sure if that was the point of this picture-a-day project, but we’ll see what develops.  get it?  develops?   heh heh  😉