SUNRISE – BAY CITY, WI
After consulting The Photographer’s Ephemeris and Skyfire app it appeared as though there would be a great chance for some color at sunrise this morning at one of my favorite locations – Bay City.
While driving from Red Wing to Bay City, my optimism for color was not increasing. When I arrived at the Bay City campground, there was a bit of color on the horizon out over the bay.
As you can see from the above photo, the cloud cover was dominating the scene. Even though it was in the single digits and quite cold, I stuck around. Clouds can shift and conditions can change rapidly. I capture three different [mostly gray] panorama via my drone.
I am always fascinated by the patterns in the snow and ice.
It didn’t look like the sunrise was going to amount to much. I put my drone away, but hung around a little longer. The sun tried a bit more to break through, but didn’t really completely. I took a couple photos with my iPhone and then there was nothing but gray.
How Skyfire app works
Skyfire forecasts are displayed as a map overlay with varying colors to indicate the type of conditions and forecast probability of a colorful sunrise or sunset. Colorful conditions arise when there are clouds in the sky that are underlit by the sun when it is near the horizon.
Although it is possible to see colorful clear skies, these colors are typically associated with twilight conditions (such as the ‘Belt of Venus’ or the deep blue/orange colors of nautical twilight). Skyfire forecasts do not cover these phenomena.
Clear skies, that is, where there are expected to be no clouds to underlight, are not assigned a color. Cloudy, overcast conditions, where the extent of the clouds precludes the chance for underlighting, are shown as white.
When cloud cover is broken, or lies at the edge of a weather front, there is a chance of colorful underlighting. The probability of a colorful sunrise or sunset developing is indicated on a color spectrum ranging from blue/green to red, where the redder the color, the higher the probability, as shown in the table below:
| Clear | Clear skies forecast |
| Cloudy | Overcast, with little chance of underlighting |
| 50% (blue) | Clouds with some chance of underlighting |
| 70% (yellow) | Clouds with a good chance of underlighting |
| 90% (red) | Clouds with a high chance of underlighting |
