SunPosition Class
The apparent position of sun at the center of the view area.
NuGet/Assembly: Carmenta.Engine.5.16.2.nupkg (in the CECore assembly)
Syntax
public class SunPosition : EngineObjectRemarks
A SunPosition is used in a View to specify where the sun is, which affects the ShadeOperator and ShadowOperator, as well as the lighting in 3D.
There are two ways to specify where the sun is, as seen from the View.Center point:
You can explicitly decree the direction and elevation angle, or
you can specify a time, from which the direction and elevation angle will be computed automatically.
From application code, just use the appropriate constructor for SunPosition. From Carmenta Studio, the explicit direction and elevation angle are used only if all the time properties are zero (the default).
If the time is given, it must be expressed in Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) or Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), which are equivalent, give or take a second. So, your application must take care of your local time zone and daylight saving time.
This class is not thread-safe but the View.SunPosition property is. This means that you can modify the position of the sun in a view without taking the global configuration lock by creating a new SunPosition instance and then assign it to the View.SunPosition property.
Acknowledgments
To compute the apparent position of the sun at a given time and place, we use the SOLPOS code from NREL (National Renewable Energy Laboratory, USA). See Acknowledgments for more information.
The accuracy of the SOLPOS code is said to be 0.01 degrees, which corresponds to the apparent movement of the sun during 2.4 seconds. Note also that the apparent diameter of the sun is 0.5 degrees.
Inheritance Hierarchy
System.Object (not available in C#)
EngineObject
SunPosition
Platforms
Windows, Linux, Android
SunPosition Members
The SunPosition type has the following members.
Constructors
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| SunPosition | Initializes a new instance of the SunPosition class. |
Properties
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| Day | Gets the day of the month, if the constructor from a time was used. |
| Direction | Gets or sets the apparent direction to the sun from the View.Center, in degrees clockwise from north. |
| Elevation | Gets or sets the apparent elevation angle to the sun from the View.Center, in degrees above the horizon. |
| Hour | Gets the hour of the day, if the sun position was initialized from a time. |
| IsDisposed | Gets a value that tells whether the current SunPosition has been disposed. Inherited from EngineObject |
| Minute | Gets the minute, if the sun position was initialized from a time. |
| Month | Gets the month, if the sun position was initialized from a time. |
| NativeHandle | Gets the native Carmenta Engine kernel object the current SunPosition represents. Inherited from EngineObject |
| Second | Gets the second, if the sun position was initialized from a time. |
| Year | Gets the year, if the sun position was initialized from a time. |
Methods
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| Clone | Creates a copy of an object. Inherited from EngineObject |
| Dispose | Releases the reference to the native Carmenta Engine kernel instance the EngineObject represents. Inherited from EngineObject |
| Equals | Determines whether this instance is equal to another. Inherited from EngineObject |
| GetPosition | Tells the apparent position of the sun, according to this instance of SunPosition. |