The Grand Conjunction 2020 - Jupiter and Saturn

On December 21th in 2020, Jupiter and Saturn met in the sky for the "Grand Conjunction". They would get the closest together in the sky for nearly 800 years. Their angular seperation was only 6.1 arc minutes. For perspective, the size of a full moon is about 30 arc minutes. Unfortunately, in Northern Illinois it was cloudy on the 21st, but it cleared off on the 22nd and I was able to capture the pair with a 10.3 arc minute seperation. With this close approach, it was fairly easy to capture both planets within a single frame.

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Lena, IL USA
22 December 2020
17:20 CST
ASI294MC
Celestron C9.25
2350mm
Celestron NexStar Evolution
Multiple
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AutoStakkert!3
Registax6
Photoshop

The image was stacked to bring out detail on Jupiter and Saturn. Some editing was done with Photoshop to enhance the moons and to modify the exposure on Saturn to make it visible in the frame.

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Freeport, IL USA
17 December 2020
21:34 CST
Canon T3i
55mm/250mm Zoom Lens
96 mm
Tripod
Single Frame
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Photoshop

The was taken 5 days before the Grand Conjunction with the 3 1/2 day old moon. You can see Jupiter and Saturn in the center left of the frame. The seperation is still less than 30 arc minutes.

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Lena, IL USA
22 December 2020
17:26 CST
Canon T3i
C55/250mm Zoom Lens
279mm 1/8 sec f/4.5
Tripod
Single Frame
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Photoshop

The image was taken on 22 December a few minutes after the main image. It shows the close approach of Jupiter and Saturn. They are in the top/center of the frame.