0 Jupiter and Venus

If you've been looking in a generally westerly direction in the early evening, you've, no doubt noticed the two exceptionally bright 'stars'.  Those are Jupiter and Venus, also exceptionally close to each other.  On one view, they're awfully close -- about 3 degrees, or 1/30th of the distance between directly overhead and the horizon.  To a different view, however, they're very far apart -- about 6 full moons would fit between them.

Technology keeps advancing.  In the 1970s, it was about all I could do to get a photograph of a nearly full moon through my telescope.  A fair amount of patience was needed to get the focus right, avoid contaminating light, and so forth.  Below is my phone photo of Jupiter (the fainter one) and Venus.  I was in a well-lit parking lot, and it wasn't much past sunset (hence the bright lower portion of the photo), and had just aimed the phone in the general direction of the planets.

I'll invite you all to contribute your own photos of the planets.