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Community photo entitled Saturn's moons and Neptune in the early morning by Tom Tan on 07/05/2025 at Melbourne, Australia

Saturn's moons and Neptune in the early morning

On 07/05/2025 05:38 am by Tom Tan | Melbourne, Australia

This is a rare shot of two planets and moons.
Saturn and Neptune are quite close together in July.
They are also very high so I have a clear view.
But they can only be seen in the early morning, ideally before twilight time.
For the moons, a better date is the 7th, when Titan will be furthest away from Saturn in its cycle but this morning is probably the only day with a clear sky here.
Anyway I got the bonus of three moons in a line (I am not sure about those other dots).

I knew the coordinates of Saturn to be 0 degrees in DEC and due north around 5:38am and Neptune would fit into the frame.
I looked up this morning and could see Saturn with my bare eyes. That helps me to point my telescope in the right direction. In the camera display, seeing the little dots next to the big dot told me I had indeed pointed at Saturn.

I was lucky that the dots did not smear even with a 2 second exposure.

So, timing, a clear sky, following coordinates and locating are more important
then picture taking or processing.

I hope some of your readers would see something in those little dots.

William Optics 61 360mm
Nikon D7500 APS-C 1.5X camera
tracking mount (not aligned), external timer
exposure bracket up to 2 seconds, ISO 3200

JPG with highlights boosted, cropped