Aruna — Maps for Photographers

Harsh tank — Mon, 13 Jul 2026 04:30:54 +0000

This is a submission for Weekend Challenge: Passion Edition

What I Built

Aruna — Maps for Photographers 📸

Tagline: Pin the place. Read the light. Shoot the frame.

Photography is more than finding a location—it's about finding the right light at the right moment.

Existing map tools can tell you where a place is, but they don't tell you how it will look through your lens.

That's why I built Aruna, a lightweight AI-powered location scouting tool designed specifically for photographers.

With Aruna, photographers can:

📍 Drop a pin or search for any location
☀️ See accurate golden hour, blue hour, sunrise, sunset, and sun direction
🤖 Generate an AI scouting briefing tailored to the location
🖼️ Discover visual inspiration based on photography styles like Landscape, Astro, Street, Wildlife, and Portrait

Instead of simply giving a map, Aruna helps photographers visualize the shoot before they even leave home.

Demo

🌐 Live App

https://aruna-light.vercel.app/

Try this flow

Open Start Scouting
Search for Kuari Pass (or any location)
Select a photography style (Landscape, Astro, Street, etc.)
Click Generate Aruna AI Briefing

You'll receive:

Accurate light information
Golden & blue hour timings
Sun direction
AI-generated scouting notes
Photography inspiration images
Suggested compositions and gear recommendations

Code

GitHub Repository

Harshtank-io / aruna

Aruna — Photographer Location Scouting

Map-centric scouting dashboard for photographers: capture a location, pick photography tags, and generate an AI briefing covering light windows, composition cues, gear suggestions, and access notes.

Built with Next.js 16 (App Router), React 19, Tailwind CSS 4, react-hook-form + Zod, and Google Gemini.

Getting Started

npm install
npm run dev

Open http://localhost:3000 — it redirects to the dashboard.

The app works without any API key: briefings fall back to a local simulated preview so the scouting flow is always usable.

Free API key setup (optional, for live AI briefings)

Get a free Gemini API key at aistudio.google.com/apikey — no billing required.
Copy .env.example to .env.local and paste your key:
```
GEMINI_API_KEY=your-key-here
```

Stretching the free tier

Key pool rotation: free-tier quota is per key. Provide several free keys comma-separated and Aruna automatically rotates to the next key when one hits its quota (429):
```
GEMINI_API_KEY=key1,key2,key3
```
Model choice:…

View on GitHub

Repository:
https://github.com/Harshtank-io/aruna

How I Built It

Tech Stack

Next.js 16 (App Router)
React 19
Tailwind CSS v4
MapLibre GL
SunCalc
React Hook Form
Zod
Google Gemini AI

Turning a passion into a product

The goal was simple:

Build the Google Maps experience photographers actually need.

That meant the map couldn't just display a marker—it needed to understand the light.

Every pin becomes the source for real astronomical calculations, allowing the AI to produce useful recommendations based on actual lighting conditions instead of hallucinated times.

Interactive map

Aruna uses MapLibre GL with 3D terrain powered by free elevation data.

Features include:

Search any location
Click anywhere to drop a pin
Forward & reverse geocoding using Nominatim
Smooth desktop experience
Mobile-first fullscreen map with bottom drawer

Accurate light calculations

Using SunCalc, Aruna calculates:

Sunrise
Sunset
Golden Hour
Blue Hour
Solar position
Sun bearing

These values are generated mathematically and then injected into the AI prompt so every briefing is grounded in real-world data.

AI Scouting Brief

Google Gemini generates a structured scouting guide that includes:

Location overview
Lighting recommendations
Best shooting angles
Composition ideas
Lens suggestions
Camera settings
Gear recommendations
Access considerations
Creative shooting ideas

The AI enhances the real astronomical data instead of replacing it.

Photography inspiration

Rather than returning generic images, Gemini helps generate search queries that are then used against:

Wikimedia Commons
Openverse

This provides style-specific inspiration for categories such as:

Landscape
Astro
Street
Portrait
Wildlife

Reliable free-tier AI

To make development practical on free API limits, Aruna supports multiple Gemini API keys.

If one key reaches a rate limit (429), it automatically rotates to the next.

If every key is exhausted, the application gracefully falls back to a locally generated scouting briefing while still using the real SunCalc data, ensuring the experience never completely fails.

UI & Design

The interface was intentionally kept calm and minimal.

Inspired by modern editorial and Awwwards-style layouts, it features:

Clean typography
Botanical hero artwork
Two-color visual system
Minimal distractions
Focus on the map and scouting workflow

The goal was to create a tool photographers would genuinely enjoy using before every shoot.

🟢 Best Use of Google AI

Google Gemini powers the intelligent scouting assistant by transforming accurate light data into practical, location-aware photography guidance. Instead of generating generic advice, the AI builds on deterministic astronomical calculations to produce meaningful recommendations photographers can actually use in the field.

Thanks for reading!

Building Aruna combined two passions—software engineering and photography. It was exciting to turn a personal workflow into a tool that helps photographers spend less time planning and more time creating.

#googleai #webdev #showdev

Tips For writing blogs ?

Harsh tank — Fri, 15 Dec 2023 06:27:39 +0000

What are the tips to write a perfect blog on specific topic ?

Will JS takeover the community ?

Harsh tank — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 20:53:51 +0000

DEV Community: Harsh tank

Aruna — Maps for Photographers

What I Built