Final answer:
Kepler noticed that the orbits of the planets were ellipses, leading to Kepler's first law of orbital motion.
Step-by-step explanation:
Kepler noticed that the orbits of the planets were not perfect circles, as previously believed, but were actually ellipses. This observation led him to propose Kepler's first law of orbital motion, which states that each planet moves around the Sun in an orbit that is an ellipse, with the Sun at one focus of the ellipse.