Do anyone know of a free program/website where I can get sunrise and set coordinates? I need this for a upcoming trip in Peru - so I am looking for something that covers that part of the world
Something to keep in mind is that these programs typically assume a flat horizon. If you're up in the mountains, your horizon could be elevated by 30 degrees, 45 degrees, or even more. That changes both the time and the azimuth of sun and moon rise and set.
Posted by David Bostedo on April 22, 2008 at 7:29 PM
Stellarium allows you to simulate different ground environments (since it's graphical). The funny thing is, there's only a few preset ones, a couple of which put large trees or buildings close to you that block a lot of the sky. Seems kind of pointless - I always just use it with the flat ground, and take a guess at how high my actual horizon will be.
If I remember correctly Galen Rowell used to have a casio watch with him, you set longitude/latitude and get the sunset/rise timings. The newer version can also tell you tide timings.
Posted by Steve Marple on April 23, 2008 at 7:54 AM
Have you looked at Heavens Above (http://www.heavens-above.com/)? You can select your location from a database or enter your coordinates and it will give you time and azimuth of sunrise and sunset. Azimuth is important for sunrise (especially green flash photography) because you need to know in advance the precise direction to look.
It won't output all times for a month but you can navigate move backwards/forwards a day at a time. It's also a very useful site if you want to photograph satellites such as the international space station. If only the weather could be predicted with such accuracy...
For trip-planning purposes, I like the simplicity of this program: Ephemeris. There's a mobile version and desktop PC version. It's prepopulated with a few dozen locations, but you can add to the list with the specific coordinates of your location.
Once out in the field, if you'll be moving around a lot, it's nice to have a GPS with sun/moon data that will update automatically as you change location.
I use this site. http://home.att.net/~srschmitt/script_sun_rise_set.html
You put in your longitude and latitude and it calculates the sunrise and sunset time and azimuth for you. There is also a similar moonrise-moonset site. I like it because it remembers my coordinates so I don't have to re-enter them every time. I prefer it to the USNO site.
It doesn't work properly with Firefox, so use Internet Explorer.
Now I'm going to go check out some of the sites recommended by others.
Posted by David Senesac on April 30, 2008 at 7:57 PM
Sunrise and sunset data like that at the USNO site are calculated for sea level thus do not take into account elevation or blocking objects east or west. Thus for the most part, photographers that use that information use it to get ball park estimates. None of us are going to specific locations a few minutes before sunrise or sunset and then expecting the sun or moon to appear or set on clocklike on time. Instead we get to a location well ahead of time, and set up our gear approximately. When one is up on top of mountains with other ranges to the east, despite having the altitude, azimuth, and time information, one almost always needs to fine tune position depending on where the brightest area seems to be rising. With the Moon since it is dim, one needs to simply hope for the best and then move quickly if it ain't rising where expected.
Instead of printing out sunrise/set times each year, I just tend to have one for the longtitude/latitude I work most in the Sierra and know that it barely changes year to year. For areas south or north a degree or two, extrapolation is simple. Thus my one chart has info for dates separated by a three weeks with each day hour by hour. Also for dates or times between hours, extrapolation works again because the time the Sun actually sets/rises is going to be crude at best. The Moon rise/set times are however variable year to year and trickier.
Related to this is being able to calculate what one can see from a specific altitude depending on blocking objects on the horizon. For instance if one is up on a 100 foot hill in front of the ocean, can you see an island sticking up 100 feet at 30 miles distance? Or if atop a 5,000 foot mountain with a 3,000 foot high ridge 10 miles away, can you see 8,000 foot mountains 80 miles away? I have an information page on my website that explains how to calculate such. Knowing all this information and how to derive the information is better to know than simply using some software program that depends on having some gadget in one's pocket. From my homepage at:
http://www.davidsenesac.com
Select this link at top right:
Tips, Tools, Information Page
Then select this information page:
Visual Line of Sight Calculations dependent on Earth's Curvature
Discussion
14 repliesThank you very much
I use this site for tide and sunrise/ sunset data
http://www.mobilegeographics.com:81/
If you scroll to the page bottom you can print data for one month. I ususally print it to fit one page and stick it in my camera bag each month.
and this one for moonrise/ moonset data:
http://www.thelunartimes.com/West_Coast_US/San_Diego,_Quarantine_Station,_California_.aspx
It covers worldwide locations, but I'm not sure to what detail.
I think Stellarium allows you to choose any location on a world map, but I'm not positive.
Something to keep in mind is that these programs typically assume a flat horizon. If you're up in the mountains, your horizon could be elevated by 30 degrees, 45 degrees, or even more. That changes both the time and the azimuth of sun and moon rise and set.
Wim
It won't output all times for a month but you can navigate move backwards/forwards a day at a time. It's also a very useful site if you want to photograph satellites such as the international space station. If only the weather could be predicted with such accuracy...
Once out in the field, if you'll be moving around a lot, it's nice to have a GPS with sun/moon data that will update automatically as you change location.
I use this site. http://home.att.net/~srschmitt/script_sun_rise_set.html
You put in your longitude and latitude and it calculates the sunrise and sunset time and azimuth for you. There is also a similar moonrise-moonset site. I like it because it remembers my coordinates so I don't have to re-enter them every time. I prefer it to the USNO site.
It doesn't work properly with Firefox, so use Internet Explorer.
Now I'm going to go check out some of the sites recommended by others.
Instead of printing out sunrise/set times each year, I just tend to have one for the longtitude/latitude I work most in the Sierra and know that it barely changes year to year. For areas south or north a degree or two, extrapolation is simple. Thus my one chart has info for dates separated by a three weeks with each day hour by hour. Also for dates or times between hours, extrapolation works again because the time the Sun actually sets/rises is going to be crude at best. The Moon rise/set times are however variable year to year and trickier.
Related to this is being able to calculate what one can see from a specific altitude depending on blocking objects on the horizon. For instance if one is up on a 100 foot hill in front of the ocean, can you see an island sticking up 100 feet at 30 miles distance? Or if atop a 5,000 foot mountain with a 3,000 foot high ridge 10 miles away, can you see 8,000 foot mountains 80 miles away? I have an information page on my website that explains how to calculate such. Knowing all this information and how to derive the information is better to know than simply using some software program that depends on having some gadget in one's pocket. From my homepage at:
http://www.davidsenesac.com
Select this link at top right:
Tips, Tools, Information Page
Then select this information page:
Visual Line of Sight Calculations dependent on Earth's Curvature
...David