Astrophotos: Crescent Moon, Mercury and Venus Together in the Sky

Last night (June 10, 2013) the two innermost worlds of our Solar System visible were joined by a very slender waxing crescent Moon, just over two days after New phase (see our preview of the event here). Several of our readers managed to capture this beautiful twilight triple conjunction. Our lead image is from Adrian New, who went to the Municipal Airport in Castroville, Texas to view the conjunction. “There was a rotating beacon light that would illuminate the planes wing tips at intervals, so I would wait to trip the shutter to capture the effect,” New said via email. This image was taken with a Nikon D800 and a 24-70mm F/2.8 lens set at 70mm @ ISO 2000 and a 1/2 second exposure.

Giuseppe Petricca from the Tuscany region of Italy said he felt lucky to manage to photograph the conjunction, “because the clouds were ‘a bit’ in the way, but also contributed positively to give a nice frame to the whole conjunction.” Giuseppe used a Nikon P90 Bridge digital camera, ISO 100, f5.6, 1/3″. Processed later with Photoshop to increase contrast to enhance the two planets in the sky.

Just a reminder to keep looking at sunset for the elusive planet Mercury. As UT writer David Dickinson said in his preview article, if you’ve never seen Mercury, this week is a great time to try.