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Outdoor photography is a great hobby. Not only do you get to see beautiful places in the best possible light (sometimes anyway!) but you also get to learn so much more about the intricate and interlinked workings of the natural world, the tides, the solar system, the seasons and the stars.
One of my favourite times for viewing and photographing the sky is when the moon is in its very early new phase, and is just visible as a thin crescent in the evening sky for an hour or two before it chases the sun down over the western horizon.
Given a clear sky at sunset, the moon will be visible while there's still the afterglow of twilight in the sky, adding a beautiful colour gradient from orange at the horizon to deep indigo overhead.
The photo shown here was taken at just such a time, from the summit of the Great Orme at Llandudno, on the North Wales coast.
My wife Liz and I had enjoyed watching and photographing a fantastic sunset but I knew that it wasn't time to pack up and go home as there would be another show in a few minutes time, and I wasn't disappointed.
Not only did we have the new moon crescent, suspended like a glowing jewel over Anglesey, but we also had the planets Venus (bright) and Jupiter (dim) in close proximity.
We were going nowhere until the last vestiges of colour had drained from the heavens and the dance of the heavenly bodies came to an end!
Tired, cold and awestruck, we eventaully wound our way down back into Llandudno for a much needed coffee and then home to bed.
Filename - moon jupiter venus 01.jpg
Camera - Canon 5D
Lens - 24-105mm zoom @ 50mm
Exposure - 6secs @ f8, ISO100
Location - Sky above North Wales coast
This image - 533x800px JPEG
Conversion - ACR & PS-CS2
Comments - Tripod, mirror lockup and cable release used to prevent camera shake
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