NEW YORK – David Conover’s main character is a fiery diva who refuses to appear when it’s cloudy but is otherwise relentlessly punctual.

The sun itself is Conover’s star in the Discovery HD Theater program “Sunrise Earth,” an hour-long TV show that documents sunrises and the gradual awakening of nature at dawn. It’s an unusually slow-paced program in a TV milieu populated by quick-cutting dramas and laugh-track heavy sitcoms – and it couldn’t exist without high-definition television, which captures every blade of grass and each beam of light. The camera often lingers for 30 to 45 seconds on one shot, allowing the viewer to soak in the experience – without voice-over narration or zooming.

“These big flat screens in our living spaces are kind of like windows,” says Conover, the 45-year-old creator and producer of “Sunrise Earth.” “I wanted to try something that would allow people to slow down, kind of be a naturalist in their own homes and essentially catch their own breath in a world of TV that is very fast-paced and frenetic.”

The detailed images and 5.1 Surround Sound encourage a feeling of being there that makes “Sunrise Earth” a prime example of the different capabilities of HD television.

More than 30 million HD TV sets have been sold in U.S., and many in the industry believe high-definition is the imminent future of television. Discovery HD Theater was started in 2002 by Discovery Communications’ founder and chairman, John Hendricks, making it one of the early networks to embrace the new medium.

The channel’s other notable programs include “Extreme Engineering,” “Destination HD” and the recently premiered “Discovery Atlas,” which documents one nation per episode. “Sunrise Earth” is in production for its third season, and airs commercial-free on weekdays at 7 a.m. and again at 10 a.m. EDT.

Though Conover is a TV veteran of nearly 20 years, making mostly nature programs about the sea and the outdoors, he lives with his family in Camden without a TV in the house. “I don’t really consider myself a TV person,” he says.

But Conover is “definitely a morning person,” and says the idea for “Sunrise Earth” was the product of many morning walks. (To get in position for the two-camera shoots, Conover and his crew typically wake up before 4 a.m., depending on the latitude and time of year.)

The show has taken him all over the world, from nearby Acadia National Park in Maine (where the first rays of sunlight hit the U.S.), to the geysers of Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, to the rice paddies of China’s Guangxi Province.

Each episode focuses on both the macro and the micro – the panorama of the rising sun and close-ups of rushing water or nestling birds. The morning activity of a waking creature is always a theme, which is presented alliteratively when possible – like “Moose in the Morning” or “Bison Before Breakfast.”

Conover and his small crew are stealthy in positioning themselves, though animals like Florida’s ever sociable manatees sometimes approach them while filming.

Weather can play havoc with scheduling, but Conover doesn’t necessarily need a clear day. A stormy morning on Cape Cod passes without the sun’s appearance, but the constant sound of the rolling, crashing tide feels like the most important characteristic of that particular dawn.

There can be suspense for the sun’s appearance, especially during a sunrise over the Li River in Xingping, China. Conover has software that tells them ahead of time exactly where the sun will rise and what its arc across the sky will be, but the sheer karst peaks on the Li hid the sun until it was well above the horizon.

The sunrises are typically condensed by about half – turning a two-hour event into 50 minutes. “It’s a wrap by breakfast,” Conover says.

Though infrequent text narration will pop up in the corner of the screen, the sunrises are otherwise presented au naturel.

“I don’t think there’s another broadcast television series out there with as many hours as we’ve done in which there’s not a single spoken human word,” says Conover.

The show, though, often includes humans, mixing nature with culture. A summer morning in Quechee Gorge, Vt., follows hot air balloons, a sunrise in New Harbor, Maine, documents lobster fisherman preparing for the day, and a morning class of tai chi accompanies a sunrise at the Golden Gate bridge in San Francisco.

Clint Stinchcomb, the executive vice president of Discovery HD Theater, says: “Not everyone can get out and see the sunrise, but most of us can pour a cup of coffee and turn on the TV.”

“We have a lot of things in our lives today that order our lives, that give a certain pace to our lives,” says Conover. “But for a millennia, it was just the sun that ordered our days. I think there’s a genetic imprint that we all have of that.”