O O O
 O O O
O O O

nearby pennies touching. By the fewest number of legal moves, transform the pattern into the pattern

   O
  O O
 O   O
O O O O

nearby pennies touching. A legal move consists of sliding a penny, not picking up a penny, without disturbing the other pennies, to a new position touching at least two pennies.

Four is correct.

  000
 000
000

becomes (1)

 000
 000
000

becomes (2)

  0
 000
 00
000

becomes (3)

  0
 000
0 0
000

becomes (4)

   0
  00
 0  0
0000

Did that make sense? Sing4TheDay has it right too...just kinda turned.