Recently there was a conjunction of the crescent Moon, Venus (also in crescent phase) and Jupiter.
It was captured by US Astronaut Scott Kelly, currently Commander of the International Space Station, with another planet added in—Earth!
Day 114. #Moon #Venus #Jupiter...#Earth Good night from @space_station! #YearInSpace pic.twitter.com/GsOxOKt34S
— Scott Kelly (@StationCDRKelly) July 19, 2015
It's rare for photos from the ISS to also feature the starfield background. There is just so much ambient light from Earth that it drowns out the fainter stars for photos. Unless you take one photo exposed for the Earth and another exposed for the stars, and combine them in Photoshop. But even then it's very hard not to have the Earth blowing out the stars where they are very close to each other.
NASA has been know to add in the relevant starfield from a completely different shot. And there's nothing wrong with that—our eyes see a much broader range of light than a camera can capture in one shot. So it's just using tools available to more closely represent what the astronauts themselves are actually seeing.
Which all makes the timing on this shot all the more wonderful to have achieved. But then, he is orbiting Earth every 79 minutes, so he probably had a few chances to get it right!
Kelly is well worth following on Twitter—he posts some great material from his unique perspective. Such as:
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| Bahamas |
#Bahamas, the strokes of your watercolors are always a refreshing sight. #YearInSpace. pic.twitter.com/ISASTDak90
— Scott Kelly (@StationCDRKelly) July 19, 2015
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| Libya |
#EarthArt The sculptural quality of Earth is like an impasto. #YearInSpace pic.twitter.com/yCPXkpXRzV
— Scott Kelly (@StationCDRKelly) July 18, 2015
Kelly certainly is one of the best photographers we've seen on the ISS. Which is good, as he's up there for a whole year!
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