Breathtaking Planets

Like two early morning dark sky beacons, the rising planets Venus and Jupiter were so bright they almost took my breath away! This east-sky image was shot around 4:13 AM, Saturday, July 28, 2012, from near Donnelly Park in Marion, Iowa. Venus shone at -4.41 magnitude and Jupiter at -2.14 magnitude. Just right of Jupiter is the "head" of the constellation Taurus the bull. Above and just right of Jupiter is the star cluster Pleiades and at far left is the 0.06 magnitude star Capella in the constellation Auriga. Venus shows a bit of an aura here because of its low position in the Earth's atmosphere which at this moment contained 96% humidity. The image is a three second exposure at f/3.8, 3200 ISO and 20mm focal length.