When the light turns warm and low, and when the sky glows deep blue after sunset, for any place and date, with the direction the Sun rises and sets.
Light on the chosen day
Morning blue hour
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Morning golden hour
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Evening golden hour
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Evening blue hour
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| Date | Blue (am) | Golden (am) | Golden (pm) | Blue (pm) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Golden and blue hour are defined by how high the Sun is, not by the clock. Here, by default, golden hour is while the Sun's centre is between 4° below and 6° above the horizon, and blue hour while it is between 6° and 4° below. These are common choices in photography planning apps, but there is no official definition: some apps use 0° to 6° or 0° to 10° for golden hour, and the blue tones are strongest with the Sun 4° to 8° down, so you can switch to those ranges. Elevations are geometric, the convention the US Naval Observatory uses for twilight, so with the default ranges the morning blue hour begins exactly when civil twilight does, with the Sun 6° below the horizon.
Pick a city or type coordinates, then a date. The four frames give the morning and evening blue and golden hours with their length. Sunrise and sunset show the compass bearing of the Sun, so you know which way to face. The chart traces the Sun's height through the day; on today's date a marker shows where it is now. The week table helps you pick a shoot day, and Add golden hours saves the week's evening golden hours as calendar events.
Near the equator the Sun drops steeply, so golden hour can last under half an hour. Far north or south it slides along the horizon: in a Scandinavian midwinter the whole short day can be golden, and in midsummer there may be no blue hour at all because the Sun never gets 4° below the horizon. The calculator says so when that happens.
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Look up a shop's domainIt depends on how steeply the Sun sets. At mid latitudes in winter it sinks at a shallow angle, so the 10° of golden-hour elevation take well over an hour.
No. Cloud and haze change the colour and contrast, not when the Sun reaches each elevation. Hills or buildings to the west end your evening light earlier.
Sunrise, sunset and twilight from the same code match the US Naval Observatory's tables for London, Sydney and Tromsø to within about a minute.