Jupiter, Venus, and Mars in this morning's sky

All photos taken with our Nikon D300 between 6:45 and 7:15 from my driveway this morning.  This exposure was about 20-seconds.  It brings stars that were not visible to the naked eye into view.  The Nikon was set to automatic aperture, manual focus. 
Same basic angle but with a 4-second exposure.
Just for fun.  This is Orion on the right side of the photo, the bright star Sirius on the left quadrant.  The very bright Moon is just out of the frame the the top right. Sirius is very close to us in terms of space, a mere 8.6 light years away.  The reddish bright dot in the upper right quadrant is Betelgeuse.  It is 427.47 light years away.  
The three-planet alignment at 20-seconds.  So many unseen stars pop out. Obviously, I am using a tripod in all these shots.
A three-planet alignment at 4-seconds. There is another, fainter star here between Venus and Jupiter.  That is Sigma Leonis, 214.02 light-years away.
Again, the beautiful alignment at 7:15 this morning.  Taken off my carport in the middle of my driveway.  It has been rainy here these past few days and the clouds had blocked our view of the alignment until this morning.  It was really nice listening to the day begin, with hot coffee standing in the 47 degree damp air watching our stellar neighborhood.
This is the alignment as seen with my iPad Star Walk app at the moment I was taking photos outside.  As you can see, even though Venus is very bright in my photos, we are still only viewing it partially shaded due to its own angle toward the Sun. Mars has an average distance of 141 million miles away.  Venus an average of 67 million miles away.  Jupiter is about 483 million miles away.

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