The basic controls in Photo WX™ are shown below:
At the top-right of the map:
- Current Location: This will use the browser’s geolocation to re-centre the map on your Current Location. You may be asked for permission to access your location.
- Blend Forecast Hour Layers: When enabled, displays a blended average of forecasts for the selected time. This allows smoother animation over time but can introduce artefacts (e.g., smeared clouds).
- Sun Direction + Day/Night Terminator: When enabled, an azimuth line is drawn from the red map pin to indicate the current direction to the Sun (except at night, after twilight); additionally, the day/night terminator is shown on the map to indicate areas in daylight.
- Moon Direction + Lunar Day/Night Terminator: When enabled, an azimuth line is drawn from the red map pin to indicate the current direction to the Moon (when risen); additionally, the lunar day/night terminator is shown on the map, indicating areas where the Moon is risen versus set.
Click the Current Time button to set the displayed time to ‘now’. You can also adjust the selected time by clicking and dragging left or right on the chart beneath the map. The area marked in yellow indicates the time span covered by the currently selected weather model, model run and forecast layer. Where the time extends beyond this range, it indicates that other models provide coverage for those periods (e.g., an earlier model run will cover earlier times, or a global model will generally extend further out in time).
Additional controls appear when the sidebar is opened – click Toggle Sidebar to show or hide it as required.
Controls Sidebar
With the sidebar open, you’ll see a number of additional controls to the right of the map. You can close the sidebar again by clicking the ‘X’ button in the lower-right:
Model, Run, Layer
The primary selection you’ll make within the controls is shown below:
- Weather Model: A variety of weather models are available, including global models such as GFS and ECMWF (lower resolution, greater coverage), regional models such as NAM (North American Mesoscale) and ARPEGE Europe (medium resolution), and finally high-resolution country-level models, such as AROME HD (France), UK Met Office, HRRR, and RAP (both North America). NOTE: Certain weather models require a paid subscription.
- Forecast Run: Each weather model is run periodically, usually hourly, or every 3/6/12 hours. When the run is complete, the raw data is published by the responsible meteorological authority. Thereafter, Photo WX ingests the data and processes it to produce the weather maps – naturally, the whole cycle takes some time, so you will see a delay between when the model was actually run and when the data is available in the UI. This is shown as a delay from the current time, e.g., -06h, in hours. We show multiple model runs: PRO users are able to compare runs to see how a forecast is evolving – a low degree of change between runs usually indicates higher confidence in the model output.
- Forecast Layer: The forecast layer selection determines what weather is shown on the map. For example, in the screenshot above, Wind Gusts are displayed. An explanation for the selected layer is shown below the layer selection controls - this states what the layer shows, and explains how it is relevant to photography, night photography and astrophotography. NOTE: The available layers vary between models and by subscription level. Each layer is available in at least one of the supported weather models – change the model selection to see what is supported.
