Shade Map
Productivity
solar and shade mapping
SHOW HN2024
685points
183comments
#29of 3,515 in 2024
Top 1%of 2024 by points
How HN took it
DebatedReal support and real criticism
32 positive, 45 neutral or asking, 8 mixed, 38 critical, out of 123 comments about the project. Thread score -0.02.
Performance: 5 for, 17 againstIdea: 17 for, 1 againstExecution: 2 for, 16 againstPricing: 2 for, 3 againstDocs: 0 for, 1 against
The thread, comment by comment
Each row is a top-level comment and its replies, in HN's order. Select a cell to open that comment on HN.
positive neutral or mixed critical about another commenter or something else the maker
What HN said
What people liked
Useful for solar, house hunting and photography planning
From 3 comments
Very nice. I was considering installing a few PV panels and was looking for something like this to estimate the solar exposure in various time periods. Works nicely to get an…
alentred on HNThis is so useful when buying a house in the country that sun is as valuable as gold and you want to maximise it in the backyard. Great tool.
goqu on HNLooks useful for photography. You can see where the light and shadow areas will be and plan out where and when to go.
abdusco on HN
Fast and polished
From 2 comments
I'm sorry, but for 18:00 Dvořáková street in Brno, Czechia, it is very inaccurate. It shows half of the street without shadow - but I know empirically the whole street is in…
jakubmazanec on HNA similar app that I found recently (as they were nominated for an Apple Design Award) that does this is Sunlitt [0]. Very polished and generally well designed. [0]:…
nnyms1 on HN
Objections
Trees are often missing or wrong in many areas
From 4 comments
This doesn't seem to have ANY of the trees in my neighborhood (in Massachusetts) even though there are just tons of very large ones.
dmd on HNHalf the trees in my neighborhood are missing.
lupire on HNDoesnt work for the map around my home. While the buildings in my neighborhood generate shadows on the map, none of the trees do.
jjslocum3 on HN"Every" seems to be a bit of a stretch trees part. It's got maybe 5% of the tree shadows near me.
davidmurdoch on HN
Building heights and footprints are often inaccurate
From 3 comments
When it doesn't have height data it seems to set every building to the same height. Interesting, but it does make it inaccurate in my country.
kilian on HNI love the idea, but sadly it's not very precise in our case. There are even buildings on the property that - as far as I know - never existed in that place.
codingminds on HNIt'd be more useful if they explained why some of the data is so inaccurate, so you could decide what to trust and what not to. In my neighborhood I found some houses not casting…
gmiller123456 on HN
Accuracy is weak on steep terrain and in rural areas
From 2 comments
Nice project, but I wouldn't claim 3m precision, at least not around steep terrain. I checked if I can use it for climbing areas, and a spot around here that goes in the shade…
sershe on HNI just had to check some really rural places and went to some random village in tibet. As there is no information about trees or buildings there, just roads, it surprisingly…
mikkom on HN
Requests
Explain data sources and accuracy by region
From 2 comments
It'd be more useful if they explained why some of the data is so inaccurate, so you could decide what to trust and what not to. In my neighborhood I found some houses not casting…
gmiller123456 on HNI don't know how the mechanics of it would work, but some kind of local accuracy index would be very useful in such broad maps. Because the elephant in the room with most global…
crtified on HN
Fix daylight saving time shadow bug
From 1 comment
I thought there was a problem with some calculation that only occurred in early March and November (which can be observed by dragging the calendar slider.) Then I realized the…
settsu on HN
Show shadows for dense urban and forest areas at all zoom levels
From 2 comments
At zoom levels where buildings aren't loaded, they're treated as casting no shadow, which causes the site to hugely underestimate the amount of shade for dense urban areas. I can…
re on HNHow are you handling shading for dense wooded areas? I'm looking around at some neighborhoods with dense redwood trees in the northern California region. I know in the middle of…
goliathDown on HN
Questions
How is tree and building height data obtained?
From 2 comments
A tall tree on my street was lost last year: it shows the shadow for it even though it’s not on the satellite image. Now I wonder where it gets the tree data from.
joshspankit on HNIts got far more buildings on this map than Open Street Map. Where are they getting the data from, and can it be added to Open Street Map?
aembleton on HN
Why does the shadow move only in length, not direction, over the year?
From 1 comment
Is it accurate though?. If I fix the time and slide by the month, I expect the shadow to move east to west, but it only grows or shortens, which would mean the sun is exactly at…
dexzod on HN
Alternatives named
Sunlitt
From 1 comment
A similar app that I found recently (as they were nominated for an Apple Design Award) that does this is Sunlitt [0]. Very polished and generally well designed. [0]:…
nnyms1 on HN
Sun Seeker
From 1 comment
If you are a photographer, I can recommend Sun Seeker on iOS. It integrates with compass (so you can see, e.g., where the sun will rise/set in real time), but also has this map…
strogonoff on HN
SunCalc
From 1 comment
Relatedly, I use this website to visualize what angle the sun is coming from: https://www.suncalc.org/
nayuki on HN
ShadowMap
From 1 comment
Related product: https://shadowmap.org/
manuelmoreale on HN