Mike's Morning Planets

For the first time in a long time I had enough good weather to get 3 planets in the same night.  Here are a tiny Mars, and my 1st of the season:

Click the image for a larger view:

rest of the season is here - http://maphilli14.multiply.com/photos/album/203#photo=1

I had to shoot Mars 1st, as it was headed for a tree limb and not to clear before dawn and the main target, Mercury.

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Next was Jupiter, just past the meridian and sporting a prominent Oval BA:

rest of the season here - http://maphilli14.multiply.com/photos/album/197/Astronomy_-_Solar_System_-_Jupiter_-_2011

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and the toughest was Mercury, if only because it didn't clear the trees until well into dawn.  I had a hard time finding the right focus positions at lower magnifications and as such, I only got a shot at native focal ratio of f/4.5.  Here's that shot, but 3x upscaled in ninox and even on the screen I could see the phase, but it's not enough magnification for any detail.  Next time!