Venus is slowing in its climb away from the Sun into the pre-dawn sky, but manages to pass Mars.
The moment when they are closest (a wide 8.7 degrees) is 18 hours Universal Time on September 2, which is in daylight about ten hours after the time of our picture.
Shown is Venus’s slender sunlit crescent, though exaggerated 200 times in size. Distant Mars appears far smaller, and is shown like the stars with a dot sized for its magnitude (brightness).
The planets have met against the background of Cancer, as can be seen in this detail from the Mars chart in Astronomical Calendar 2015.
