In August 2009, the Cassini spacecraft gathered a series of pictures of Saturn's rings during equinox. This image is a digital composite of 75 these images. The rings appear unusually dark, and a very thin ring shadow line can be made out on Saturn's cloud-tops. Objects sticking out of the ring plane are brightly illuminated and cast long shadows. Every 15 years, as seen from Earth, Saturn's rings point toward the Earth and appear to disappear. The rings are so thin and the Earth is so near the Sun that when the rings point toward the Sun, they also point nearly edge-on at the Earth.