@corypoolephotography

Parade of Planets Zoomed in on Mercury, and Venus. Mercury is over to the left just above the crags and just right of the tree. And we also have bonus appearances by the Crescent Moon showing great Earth Shine and the gorgeous Seven Sisters (The Pleiades). They are all rising just before the sun over the Castle Crags of Northern California. This was the shot that inspired me to go out shooting the two nights in a row and spending a day scouting locations. I'd been encouraged by many people to go out and shoot all the planets in a line but I wasn't actually that interested because I knew how wide of a view the planets would take up and how small they would appear in a photo as a result. But I figured that if I could get an interesting composition with a smaller group of them that I could do it a bit more justice. When I saw on planetarium software how great this smaller section of the sky was going to look early Saturday Morning I spent a day pouring over maps and playing with software trying to find a worthy foreground that I could make line up with the sky. This is made more difficult by the fact that I had to capture Mercury before being obscured by the growing light of the soon to be risen sun. As a result, Mercury needed to be mostly above the haze and also below about 4 or 5 degrees up into the sky. I ended up finding this spot and am very happy with how everything turned out. Also, I'm glad that it inspired me to explore some new places and get out and take several other shots that have been on my list for years. And seeing the parade of plants in person was awesome and I'm fairly happy with the first picture I shared with you showing the whole set of them. I did take a couple more shots showing them all the next night...and I have high hopes that they will also be good. I'll try and get to them within the next week or so. Hope you enjoy! :) #planetparade #crescentmoon #venus #mercury #sevensisters #pleiades #castlecrags #mtshasta #mountshasta #reddingca #Redding #northerncalifornia #norcal #astrophotography #astrophoto #nasa #apod #astronomy #potd #picoftheday #moonrise #moon #moonset #sunrise #sunset #sunrises #sunsets #nightsky