The Venus and Jupiter Conjunction, Prepare for the Finale on July 1!

If you have been watching Venus and Jupiter draw together over the past few days, be prepared for the spectacular denouement. Tonight (30th June) and July second (Thursday) Venus and Jupiter will be about a Lunar diameter away from each other (about half a finger width, when they can be covered with an outstretched finger).

On Wednesday 1 July (that will be June 30 in the US)  the pair will be just 21 minutes of arc away from each other, this means you can see them both in a low power eyepiece on most telescopes. Look to the north-western sky anytime from half an hour after sunset to between 8 – 8:30 pm (depending on how level and unobscured your horizon is). If you have the sea as your western horizon the pair setting should be amazing.
 

Telescopic view of Jupiter and Venus on 1 July, simulated for a 6″ Newtonian with a 10 mm eyepiece. (click to embiggen).

On the 30th June to 2 July the pair will fit comfortably in a low power telescope field.

On the 1st, they will fit in a medium power telescope field (simulated to the left), where the crescent Venus and banded Jupiter will be obvious.

Photographing the pair is easily done with point and click cameras that have a manual exposure of up to 10 seconds and a manual autofocus override. You will need a decent optical zoom and an exposure of at least 10 seconds to pick up Jupiter’s Moons without a telescope. 

Holding your mobile phone to a telescope eyepiece may produce reasonable results if you can hold it steady.  For my point and shoot I use a special adaptor, but if you are steady you may also get good results. Scroll down to the bottom of this page to see some of the set-ups I have used to photograph Lunar eclipses.