Night Sky Photography -- 08-01-2024 -- Planets & Morning Constellations Rising

Good morning, y'all!

Well folks, very early this morning -- at about 90 minutes before sunrise -- I went out into my backyard to capture a pair of really outstanding shots of the planets Jupiter, Mars, & Uranus as they appeared in the sky just above the trees.

In the first photo, I labeled the planets, as well as the brightest stars of the Constellations Taurus The Bull and Auriga The Charioteer, with the Waning Crescent Moon lower on the horizon. In the second photo, I outlined both constellations and all of the stars that made up both. They came out really clear in the shots. In addition to the stars of the Hyades Star Cluster, which makes up the head of Taurus The Bull, I captured the stars of the Pleiades Star Cluster just above it and marked the position of the planet Uranus.

Jupiter and Mars are both easy to spot as the two planets still remain close to the bright red giant star, Aldebaran and appear as a triangle of "stars" inside the Constellation Taurus. Both planets are moving ever closer to a conjunction on the mornings of Wednesday, August 14th and Thursday, August 15th later this month.

Uranus is slightly harder to spot unless you know precisely where to look. At the present time the position of the distant 7th planet of our Solar System can be found about two degrees, or so, to the left of the Pleiades Star Cluster. I marked the location in both photos since. If you have a good telescope, or a really good pair of binoculars, y'all should have no trouble spotting the faint planet about an hour before sunrise.

The brightest star of the Constellation Auriga is Capella, the sixth-brightest star in the night sky, and the third-brightest in the northern celestial hemisphere after Arcturus and Vega.

Although it appears to be a single star to the naked eye, Capella is actually a quadruple star system -- two binary pairs, made up of two bright-yellow giant stars, (Capella Aa and Capella Ab) both of which are around 2.5 times larger than our own Sun, and two smaller and relatively cool red dwarf stars (Capella H and Capella L) which are around 10,000 astronomical units (AU) from the other pair. The system is relatively close to our Solar System, estimated to be about 42.9 light-years (or 13.2 parsecs) from the Sun.

Both the Constellations Auriga and Taurus are connected by the bright star, Elnath, which also happens to be the second-brightest star in both constellations. Elnath is a giant star about 134 light-years (or 41 parsecs) from the Sun. 

Well I hope y'all enjoyed my photos. I hope to have more soon, good weather permitting. Have a wonderful Dixie day, and be sure to keep looking at the skies, y'all.