Re: uffington horse and the sun | Forum

thesweetcheat Aug 18, 2017 21:56:04

Replying to tiompan

tiompan wrote:

They were of the horse and the sunset from the observing position was not to the right .

The photos in your link are close up and at a position that doesn't allow the viewer to even see the whole horse. But even from there, if the sun is behind the viewer as ED suggests, the horse is still running generally towards it, not away from it, as the horse is clearly angled so that the head is nearer to the viewer than the tale is. The horse is going to run past the viewer as it heads along the side of the hill, it's not running away from them.

From the train, which is one of the best angles to see the horse as a horse without taking to the air:

http://www.themodernantiquarian.com/post/37824/uffington_white_horse.html

The sunset would be over to the viewer's right, out of shot.

Evergreen Dazed Aug 18, 2017 21:59:43

Replying to thesweetcheat

thesweetcheat wrote:

tiompan wrote:

They were of the horse and the sunset from the observing position was not to the right .

But even from there, if the sun is behind the viewer as ED suggests, the horse is still running generally towards it

No it isn't! I have absolutely no idea how you are you arriving at that conclusion.
It is very obviously not running generally towards it under those circumstances.

tiompan Aug 18, 2017 22:13:10

Replying to thesweetcheat

thesweetcheat wrote:

[quote="tiompan"] But even from there, if the sun is behind the viewer as ED suggests, the horse is still running generally towards it, not away from it, as the horse is clearly angled so that the head is nearer to the viewer than the tale is. The horse is going to run past the viewer as it heads along the side of the hill, it's not running away from them.

But you know that isn't true , because you know what direction the horse is headed in ,if it were moving .
That is the bottom line it is not heading towards any sunset no matter what the author imagined .
There are countless points where the entire horse is in view and with the observer facing it the sunset will not be to their right . It's just a case of trawling through pics to find examples .The point 51.578610 ,-1.575137 would be a good example there must be pics from that point .
But what does it matter, that when observing a monument the sunset would be to your right or left or straight on or behind you ? Do you really believe that is salient ? What would it imply etc ?