Planets Jupiter and Venus are currently gathered in the western sky as they do from time to time. This evening, I went out with the new camera on a tripod and played around with some of the settings and modes to get this image of the conjunction in the twilight. I took this image using the AV or “aperture priority” mode on the camera. You can see the two brightest objects are Jupiter (left) and Venus. Our neighbor’s illuminated flagpole is visible near the bottom of the frame. Click on the image to enlarge.
Must be really nice to have CLEAR sky!
After I turned off the flood lights on the RV drive, I could see the Pleiades, Orion’s nebulae and the Milky Way. Today, however, the clouds have rolled in. Forecast is for “partly cloudy” this evening, so maybe I can get another shot of the conjunction after sunset.
There’s a really neat picture you can take if the sky is dark enough. Point your camera due South, at about a 45* angle up. Leave the shutter open for about 10~15 minutes. You’ll get a nice shot of star trails, and in the background you’ll see a string of little “stars” that are fixed while everything else goes moving past them.
It’s the satellites out in geosynchronous orbit, and it makes an interesting phot.
I guess I’ll have to try that from a darker location. Our neighbor on the hill across the way has an outdoor lamp that would mess with a shot to the south.