"Edouard Poor" <pov### [at] edouardinfo> wrote:
> I read the ratio of the diameter to distance was 109. So if you put the sun at
> <1000,1000,500> you make it vlength(<1000,1000,500>)/109 wide (as an area_light
> for example).

The Sun's diameter is 1,390,000 km.  The average distance from Sun to Earth is
149,600,000 km, but this distance varies by several million km through the
year.  (It's shortest in January and longest in July.)  The ratio therefore
averages 107.6, although 109 is within range.

                            Distance    Ratio
   Perihelion (January 4)  147.09 Mkm   105.8
   Average (April, Oct.)   149.60 Mkm   107.6
   Aphelion (July 4)       152.10 Mkm   109.4

(I'm somewhat sure that I haven't got these numbers backwards; however, I caught
an error in my draft of such magnitude that a critic's eye would be in order,
just to make sure.)

My data are from http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/factsheet/earthfact.html
and http://www.nineplanets.org/ .

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