The MESSENGER spacecraft snapped a series of images as it approached Venus on June 5. The planet is enshrouded by a global layer of clouds that obscures its surface to the MESSENGER Dual Imaging System (MDIS) cameras. This single frame is part of a color sequence taken to help the MESSENGER team calibrate the camera in preparation for the spacecraft's first flyby of Mercury on January 14, 2008.
These images are from MESSENGER, a NASA Discovery mission.
Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington