Pre-Dawn Performance

The planets Venus and Jupiter were back within a few degrees of one another in the east sky during the early morning hours of Tuesday, July 10, 2012. Venus shone at a stunning -4.47 magnitude, while Jupiter also delighted at -2.07 magnitude. Also in the mix was the 0.84 magnitude star Aldebaran (in the constellation Taurus and seen just below and right of Venus), and the 1.62 magnitude star Elnath (also in Taurus and seen above the tree line in the bottom image at left). Aldebaran is 65 light years from Earth, Elnath 131 light years. The Pleiades star cluster is visible above Jupiter in the lower image. The images were captured from Archer Drive in the new housing development of Bowman Meadows, just south of Boyson Road in Marion, Iowa. The top image, shot at 4:54 AM, is a 3 1/2-second exposure at f/11, 640 ISO and 40mm focal length. The bottom image, shot at 4:43 AM, is a 5-second exposure at f/13, 1000 ISO and 26mm focal length. Clouds just above the horizon were slowly drifting from right-to-left.