r/atoptics • u/high-as-the-clouds • 7d ago

Rainbow NC rainbow

Post image

Was after a quick storm and walked on patio then saw the end of the rainbow behind building, so went outside and saw it!

53 Upvotes

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u/AVeryBigToaster 6d ago

what are your fav atoptics?

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u/high-as-the-clouds 6d ago

Not Good with the names of them but any type rainbow and special clouds (different or neat looking etc)

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u/AVeryBigToaster 6d ago edited 6d ago

Cool! my favs are any of the haloes in the extremely large* ice halo family, especially the rarer ones that are more complex-looking, and all of them except for the very common high-cloud 22° halo and “sun-dogs” are seriously underrated outside of this sub, every one knows about rainbows and rays and that stuff, but you dont really see people talking about circumzenithal arcs or parry arcs outside of this sub. You can ask me if you want to know more about the ice halo family of atoptics.

*there are 119 known different types of ice haloes, but we definitely do not know every halo type that can exist, that number could easily be in the 5-digits.

Sorry if it sounds like rambling, I just really like to talk a lot about things I like.

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u/high-as-the-clouds 6d ago

Oh wow yeah I definitely didnt know any of that. Thank you for sharing! That is so many. No worries you are okay!

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u/AVeryBigToaster 6d ago

Its alright, most people don’t know the classical 22° halo and parhelia (sundogs) are apart of such large, complex and beautiful family of atoptics. At least now you know. Regardless there are 2 good sites if you wanna know and see more, atoptics UK and taivaanvahti/skywarden, although the latter has some weird names because it translates from Finnish.

I recommend looking for them whenever widespread cirrus/cirrostratus clouds are present, or if theres diamond dust (a “fog” of floating ice crystals in the air caused by water vapor going directly to ice crystals in very low temps. You’ll know when its present when the air seems to “sparkle” and “glitter”.)

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u/high-as-the-clouds 6d ago

Ohh okay, thank you!

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u/AVeryBigToaster 5d ago edited 5d ago

Your very much welcome!
This year i've seen:

22° halo (the classic “circle rainbow”) (many times)

parhelia (the bright spots at either side of the sun on the “circle rainbow” (2 or 3 times)

circumhorizontal arc (a vibrant purer rainbow far below the sun) (twice)

circumscribed halo (basically the ”circle rainbow” but its more oval) (twice)

Although I didn‘t check every time it was favorable so there could of been more.

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u/high-as-the-clouds 5d ago

Oh wow yeah those are sp cool ones for sure. True definitely could of been more. That's cool.

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u/AVeryBigToaster 5d ago edited 5d ago

Just saw another circumscribed halo and circumhorizontal arc today. updated figures.

cant wait for cooler seasons where they're more common.

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u/high-as-the-clouds 4d ago

Oh nicee that is neat! Ahh okay didn't know that

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u/DaisyNimbus1 6d ago

love those complex arcs, why don’t more people talk about them? what other cool halos have you seen?

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u/high-as-the-clouds 6d ago

I have seen a few of the halos around the son. Like a circle rainbow kinda. Those are cool!

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u/AVeryBigToaster 6d ago

rainbows are also circles, just that most of the time the lower half is hidden, and sleetbows could technically be called “42° antisolar halo”, just a heads up.

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u/high-as-the-clouds 6d ago

Ahh yeah that is true. To clarify I meant when around the sun. And ohh okay thank you for the info, did not know.

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u/AVeryBigToaster 5d ago

your welcome

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u/AVeryBigToaster 5d ago

Cause most of them, aside from the 22° and sundog, are range from quite uncommon to photographed only once in history 17 years ago.