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The Transit of Venus 6/8/2004
The picture above shows the excellent view I had of the eastern horizon from Worcester Regional Airport in Worcester, Massachusetts. This was the view just minutes prior to sunrise (5:08 a.m. EDT) on the morning of the Venus transit. As you can see the clouds were pretty thick but that didn't spoil the view of the transit.
Sunrise.
The equipment I used to take these images of the transit included a 90mm Meade ETX telescope, a Canon PowerShot S50 digital camera and an Orion full-apeture glass solar filter.
Transits of Venus across the face of the Sun are among the rarest of planetary alignments. In fact, only seven such events have occurred since the invention of the telescope (1631, 1639, 1761, 1769, 1874, 1882 and 2004). The next transit of Venus will occur on June 6, 2012. After that you'll have to wait another 105 years for the next Venus transit to occur on December 11, 2117.
The black silhouette of the planet Venus against the Sun filtered by wisps of low clouds.
I used the zoom on the S50 to take this shot just prior to 3rd contact. It's been debated as to whether or not the "black drop effect" happened this time around. Some people say they saw it, others say they didn't but I think this shot hints that it did in fact happen. I'll let you be the judge.
Venus takes a bite out of the Sun.
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