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location of sunrise


Ari Amit

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Hi guys,

I have to shoot a commercial in which i need to know the exact spot of sunrise.

I have to shot actors while the sun is rising on their faces and I need to know exactly where to put the camera in advance and be ready for the shot. Of course I can go there at sunrise but I gues there is more an elegant way...

I know there are all sorts of calculators

Any suggestions???

thanks

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Hi guys,

I have to shoot a commercial in which i need to know the exact spot of sunrise.

I have to shot actors while the sun is rising on their faces and I need to know exactly where to put the camera in advance and be ready for the shot. Of course I can go there at sunrise but I gues there is more an elegant way...

I know there are all sorts of calculators

Any suggestions???

thanks

 

I believe the Naval Observitory is in charge of when and where the sun rises. I think it's where the Dick lives too.

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Take a compass to the location. I don't know what country you are in because you did not specify, but if you are in the Northern Hemisphere, then the sun rises in the east and sets in the west and moves along the southern sky. So determine with the compass exactly where east is. Then use a clinometer toward that direction to determine the height of the horizon line relative to where you are standing AKA azimuth. This will help you if there are hills, trees or anything else. Make a note of this. Use a program like sunpath. Plug in the location and day you are shooting. It will give you a plot of where the sun will be every 15 minutes in azimuth. It will also tell you the time of sunrise and sunset, but you will need to know that clinometer info that you collected to determine the actual sunrise for your location.

 

Sunpath is expensive (about $200), but it is very good. If you want to spend less, there is a program for a PDA called planetarium that is very good and very cheap.

 

Hope this helps.

 

One more important thing, please go into your profile settings and change your username to your first and last name as this is a requirement of this forum.

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Sunpath is expensive (about $200), but it is very good.

Much less spendy for a one-shot job, go to the library and get a celestial navigation book. In addition to knowing the azimuth of sunrise, you're also going to need to know about magnetic deviation at your location in order to use the compass. An alternative would be to get the direction to a known star at a known time beforehand, and just measure the angle over from there.

 

Another wild card -- are there mountains or trees in the BG that will put the sunrise at some elevation above the geometric horizon?

 

Back in 1978, I shot a rollercoaster documentary. For that job, I learned enough to do reverse sight reductions, and predict the path of the sun for every day and location. I remember it being fun and not too difficult, but of course I've forgotten all the math.

 

Edit: I just found a site that may have some of the table data you'll need, once you learn from the book how to use it:

 

http://www.tecepe.com.br/scripts/AlmanacPagesISAPI.isa

 

Edit again: Another idea: Find your location in Google Earth, and a distant landmark that you saw when scouting. Get the angle to that landmark from GE.

 

 

 

 

 

-- J.S.

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It's not that much.

 

I got my copy off Filmtools here. It's a great little program to have, particularly when you have a sunrise/sunset type shot where the sun position needs to be exact and the light is changing very fast. Plus, the company is super cool. I got a brand new copy in the mail from them when they upgraded the program!

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Figuring out where the sun will rise is not THAT difficult. If you are anywhere in the area the day before, just take note of where it came up. Does this have to be exact? Aren't you doing any location scouting? For me, if I was doing an important sunrise shot, I would location scout it and actually watch the sun come up, to see how the light plays on that location.

 

Here's a website that can give you some ballpark numbers if you're near major cities. I'm sure there are others sites out there that can give you exact azimuth info.

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Even better than a program, there was a Sun Position compass out about a year ago. It was a small chart that you put a compass on, and you would use the chart along with your compass reading to figure out where the sun was coming up and going down. Sadly I cannot find this anymore. Does anyone know where they are sold now?

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  • 2 weeks later...
I believe the Naval Observitory is in charge of when and where the sun rises. I think it's where the Dick lives too.

 

I'm not even sure that I get it, but that has got to be one of the funniest things I've ever read on this site!...

 

:)

 

I've used a chart online which (I believe) also comes from the Naval Observatory. And it works great, unless you happen to be shooting from a hotel deck in Oakland, CA that apparently is full of magnetic rebar that screws with your compass so much that the sun rises about 50 degrees north of where it is supposed too!

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