This is the first of our reader QuickTips which comes to us courtesy of Clark Morris, Senior Editor of 30 Second Street. I have to honestly say that I have never thought of the left to right, right to left direction of a sunrise or sunset when I have quickly hit the reverse button in my NLE to turn that sunrise to a sunset, or vice versa. But I’ll take Clark’s word for it and heed this advice the next time. Take it away Clark!
Reversing Sunset to make Sunrise (or vice versa)
Have you ever had a timelapse sunset and need it to be a sunrise (or vice versa)? DON’T just reverse it! I know from personal experience that people DO take notice of this when it’s wrong. (A common mistake seen often in reality shows.)
When using a timelapse sunset (for example), sun ball moves from left to right.
If you want to make the sunSET appear as a sunRISE, impulse is to just reverse the shot. But now sun ball is moving right to left (and the Earth is now spinning incorrectly).
You need to also FLIP the reversed shot to make it move left to right again.
I won’t claim to know how this works in the Southern Hemisphere, but rule of thumb – sun ball needs to move in same direction as the original, or you are messing with the Earth’s rotation.
