Perspectives: Whenever Mercury passes slowly between the Earth and the sun, (a reletively rare event,) the small planet can be seen as a tiny dot, not visible without a light reducing filter and magnification.
Above –> The sun is about 93 million miles (150 mil. km) away from Earth, and Mercury 67 million miles (108 mil. km) away at this time. It is the tiny dot at the lower left just starting its apparent crossing, called a Transit! What is unique in this image is the smokey jet plane contrail (exhaust) seen in front of the upper part of the sun …about seven miles away.
Above –> 6 1/2 hours later, the transit is ending as the planet, at the 3:00 o’clock position to the right, moves past the sun’s disk. (ZOOM IN TO SEE THIS.)
Thanks for viewing. Comments are always welcome and zoom in for a closer look. M:-)
Great work. I was hoping you might be taking some shots of this event to post.
It began at midnight here in Sydney, so not visible – and I watched part of it on a live webcast.
The contrails make the Sun look like Saturn without the rings.
I didn’t become aware of this until two days ago and, being busy, don’t have the time to acquire the proper equipment.
But, I’ll be ready for the next one.
Neat capture with the dot right at the edge.
wonderful!
Ggreybeard: Thanks! We had some high clouds, to which I took advantage with the contrail adding a little more interest. M 🙂
Disperser: You would have done well with just the P 900, especially with a little post processing. As with the May, 2016’s transit, I just used the 150-600 lens on my Nikon for reasonably good results, but with a compromise to better resolution for tiny Mercury. My quick and special asset is a neutral density solar filter that fits nicely on the lens.
I believe the next T O M visible in the US will be 2049, …I not planning on catching that one. Europe, and maybe Ggreybeard down under, may be facing the right direction for the one in 2032. M 🙂