STRANGE Star of Planet

[007]

Venus....cool! Isn't it neat that you can see all those different colors of it, in the pics....wonder if that is different gases being released or just the sun shining on it....?

My camera is a piece of crap too, usually doesn't take pics at night, but because this was so bright, i suppose, the pics came out....

I'm dying for a new camera that is a really super duper one....!

Can't imagine what good pics of this it would have taken!

care

Very cool pics care. My guess is the different colors showing up in your pic is because of the different wave lengths of light that make up colors. The digital zoom on your camera wasn't able to focus on the planet, especially if you were hand holding it, so it just refracted the light into what you got in your pics.

I have a Canon S3 IS, and I'd love a new camera myself. Something along the line of a Nikon D80.

 

[American Horse]

My husband and i took a long walk this evening and the first Star out was just showing up right as we were getting home...I had my camera with me, because we had just gotten 20 inches of snow and I wanted to take pictures of the woods and wildlife if we saw any, on our walk.

My first pic shows in the dark, my Cape roof and the star in the background, then the next few pics where i zoomed in as far as I could on some, speak for themselves!

They are so cool....

What the heck it is, I don't know? I think it seems to look more like a planet...from up here in maine, it was in my south west sky.

On January 21, 2009:
Mercury is transiting the sun thus invisible in front of the sun's disc (in daylight)

Venus is your evening star and with magnification would be about equivalent to a half-moon phase so it would not be round but half round. (and yellowish/brown in color)

Jupiter, normally a brilliant "star" would be too near to the sun in the sky to be visible. (and brownish in color)

Uranus and Neptune are both in the evening sky (west) but present such small angular size that a good 8" telescope would not give an image the size of the one in your picture.

Saturn would be at zenith (straight up) at about 3-A.M. (so it is more a morning object) and small in even an 8 inch scope.

Mars is very close to the sun in the morning sky and in the east.

I'm sorry to offer a mundane explanation but since it was so large in your camera's eye, and the image so diffused and discolored by refraction, I suspect it was some ordinary light relatively close, well within the earth's atmosphere and as near as a quarter mile or closer as a measure of distance.

Here's a url that once you register you can locate planets and the moon at any time of the year in the years between 1915 and 2086. I haven't made 15 posts yet so I can't provide a URL but search "simsolar.com" and procede from that opening page.

I've been using it for some time with no ill effects, but carefully read the system requirements before downloading anything.

...

 

[FistyTheBadger]

So THAT'S where I put my bowling ball!

 

[xsited1]

It's Venus, the 3rd brightest object in the sky.

Venus....cool! Isn't it neat that you can see all those different colors of it, in the pics....wonder if that is different gases being released or just the sun shining on it....?

My camera is a piece of crap too, usually doesn't take pics at night, but because this was so bright, i suppose, the pics came out....

I'm dying for a new camera that is a really super duper one....!

Can't imagine what good pics of this it would have taken!

care

Look at it through a telescope. It'll look like one of these pictures:

 

[American Horse]

It's Venus, the 3rd brightest object in the sky.

My camera is a piece of crap too, usually doesn't take pics at night, but because this was so bright, i suppose, the pics came out....

I'm dying for a new camera that is a really super duper one....!

Can't imagine what good pics of this it would have taken!

care

Look at it through a telescope. It'll look like one of these pictures:

Xsited, your chart is very helpful. You must be at least an amateur astronomer. It didn't occur to me that the whole diffusion in the image might be the quality of Care's camera, that it could've been badly out of focus. Thumbs Up!

 

[sitarro]

Venus....cool! Isn't it neat that you can see all those different colors of it, in the pics....wonder if that is different gases being released or just the sun shining on it....?

My camera is a piece of crap too, usually doesn't take pics at night, but because this was so bright, i suppose, the pics came out....

I'm dying for a new camera that is a really super duper one....!

Can't imagine what good pics of this it would have taken!

care

Very cool pics care. My guess is the different colors showing up in your pic is because of the different wave lengths of light that make up colors. The digital zoom on your camera wasn't able to focus on the planet, especially if you were hand holding it, so it just refracted the light into what you got in your pics.

I have a Canon S3 IS, and I'd love a new camera myself. Something along the line of a Nikon D80.

Hey Pale, spend the extra and get the D90 it's worth it. The guts are almost the same as the D300, it small like the D80 and it shoots video! Check it out.Nikon D90

 

[Meister]

My husband and i took a long walk this evening and the first Star out was just showing up right as we were getting home...I had my camera with me, because we had just gotten 20 inches of snow and I wanted to take pictures of the woods and wildlife if we saw any, on our walk.

My first pic shows in the dark, my Cape roof and the star in the background, then the next few pics where i zoomed in as far as I could on some, speak for themselves!

They are so cool....

What the heck it is, I don't know? I think it seems to look more like a planet...from up here in maine, it was in my south west sky.

Jupiter...you can see the color bands. Jupiter can be quite large at times. Venus looks like the moon....all white.

 

[Care4all]

our skies are pitch black here....nothing around that emits light in the direction of this planet that i could see? the best star gazing in the world up here imho!

it looked white to my naked eye....way smaller than the moon....i see it every night as my first star....it moves with seasons from east southeast to west southwest this time of year....about 3 days after these pics it had a thing on the local news saying it was venus.....

so it was venus!!

 

[Meister]

our skies are pitch black here....nothing around that emits light in the direction of this planet that i could see? the best star gazing in the world up here imho!

it looked white to my naked eye....way smaller than the moon....i see it every night as my first star....it moves with seasons from east southeast to west southwest this time of year....about 3 days after these pics it had a thing on the local news saying it was venus.....

so it was venus!!

Mystery solved...I was going by the color bands in the pictures.

 

[Care4all]

our skies are pitch black here....nothing around that emits light in the direction of this planet that i could see? the best star gazing in the world up here imho!

it looked white to my naked eye....way smaller than the moon....i see it every night as my first star....it moves with seasons from east southeast to west southwest this time of year....about 3 days after these pics it had a thing on the local news saying it was venus.....

so it was venus!!

Mystery solved...I was going by the color bands in the pictures.

my camera is crapola....surprised it even allowed me to zoom in and take the pics at all....if i had a great camera, who the heck knows what it would have looked like? maybe not nearly as pretty so maybe there is some advantage of a cruddy camera!!!!

care

 

[strollingbones]

nice pics

 

[Grind]

I'm a little iffy on whether or not it's venus, I may side with the few saying it was jupiter (or it could be saturn)

My logic for this is your first image of it (when it's small) has it as a tiny pinprick and it's not even that bright. Venus is always ultra bright and you can easily find it in the sky.

But perhaps it's just how the picture came out.

 

[editec]

It's either Jupiter or Mars.

Was it below the cresent moon?

Then it's mars.

Otherwise it's Jupiter.

Yeah, living on the edge of one of the only places on the East coast that isn't completely polluted by light does make for some pretty spectacular astronomical viewings, doesn't it?

Most people who haven't gotten to anyplace outside the light pollution haven't got a clue what the night sky actually looks like. they cannot see the milky way. They cannot see the seven sisters they can see perhaps 10% of what you and I can see at night.

On the other hand, few of them are probably worried about dying in a moose v car accident, too.

Tradeoffs of life, I guess.