Compass, North Offset & Time of day. Is it buggy? Can someone explain me how to use it to get correct results?

I have the impression that compass and accompanying 'north offset' are not correct. You can easily test it yourself with a new projekt. Set date to midsummer and time to high noon (12:00). Place a pole or streetlight and watch its shadow. Shadow and white (South) hand of compass should be in line. Am I correct? But what you see is this:

TM screenshot july 12-00 zero offsetIt looks like a deviation of about 100°.

But it gets even worse when you go into 'orthographic view'. Which certainly for most is the advocated view to position your project's north offset correctly:

TM screenshot july 12-00 zero offset orthographic viewHere we see a deviation in the opposite direction of about 130°.

Another notion: (Back in standard view) you can try any north offset value, you never get shadow and compass needle in line!

If I'm not completely wrong about this, DON'T TRUST THE COMPASS! (Until it's fixed).

Screenshots are done with 2022.1.2 and skydome OFF.

Hello ,

Thank you for posting in the community the issue with the North Arrow on the plan (orthogonal top) view. We have documented this bug and will be addressing it in a future release. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

I also checked the viewport north arrow and shadow location based on the scene location and comparing it to the a sun rise and sun set calculation data. It seems to be correct as the North is not always set at noon for many places.

Kind regards,

Vincent B.

Thanks Vincent. Indeed, I wasn't aware that, at least in summer daylight saving time, the sun 'culmination' time may differ so much from clock midday. And TM seems to count in DST, it makes large jumps when changing month setting from March to April and Oct. to Nov. For the building's location suncalc.org states 13:32 for July 15th. With that in mind I will be able to establish the correct North offset.

Glad to hear that the problem in Orthoview is addressed! Thanks.

Hello ,

Thank you for the follow-up reply and I believe the month day we use is the 20th of each month in the Location settings. You are correct at this time it looks like DST is automatically taken into consideration. Feel free to make suggestions on the road-map if there are any ideas or wishes to help with theses shadow settings: https://portal.productboard.com/7pu88c9kpmqtzt8hwg6arujh/tabs/4-under-consideration

Kind regards,

Vincent B.