GE Plugin Archives

June 22, 2009

New Places Site - Record Movie Postcards in Google Earth

Just a month ago, PlanetInAction.com released a really cool Google Earth game called "Ships" - a simulator game for ships completely run with the Google Earth API in the browser plugin (read the GEB review). One of the features I was particularly impressed with was the really innovative camera modes of the simulator.

Now the author of Ships, Paul van Dinther, has just released another cool free application he calls "Places". This application leverages some of his work with cameras to produce the "next generation postcard". Instead of a static postcard photo, how about sending a dynamic 3D postcard using Google Earth? This goes way beyond just sending a placemark, and it leverages new GE technology.

Once you pick a place, you can do more than just send it along with a greeting. You can also record a flying tour of the location. Paul has created a custom "helicopter"-like camera and interface using the mouse and keyboard shortcuts that has to be tried to really appreciate. He has a drop down help card that will explain the shortcuts. You can get cinematic like motions to fly around. Not only that, but you can record your flying tour as a GE 5 Tour - the end result is a simple URL you can send someone to see your movie postcard. This is very cool! Watch a video introduction to Places:

You can also check out a couple of example postcard movies here: Grand Canyon and Mt. St. Helens

The interface has this handy gadget in the upper right that lets you expand the plugin to full "screen" view in your browser. This makes the experience much more immersive. You can easily back out by hitting the ESC key. Google should offer this "full-screen" gadget mode as a standard option for GE plugin apps.

I highly recommend trying out the custom camera/flying interface, and the easy way to generate a movie/Tour with the GE plugin. The flying tool is one of the best interfaces for flying in Google Earth I've seen to date. You could make some cool movies with this. I've already asked Paul, and he says he might be willing to create a custom Google Earth movie camera tool. If you think this would be a cool idea, you should leave him a comment.

Posted by FrankTaylor at 6:50 AM

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June 18, 2009

Gimme Shelter Campaign via Google Earth

Google has announced a very powerful Google Earth file for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The UNHCR organization provides shelter and assistance to millions of people forced from their homes - mostly by political circumnstances. With a staff of only 6500, the organization is helping millions of desperate people. The evidence of just how bad the plight is for refugees can be seen right in Google Earth. The file will fly you to many refugee camps so you can see what is happening, and learn about the challenges people are facing in remote places around the world (it used to be "out of sight, out of mind", but times are changing).

June 20th is World Refugee Day, and to help send out word about the plight of refugees to the world, Google has added recent imagery of refugee camps - and created a very dramatic tour of just a few refugee camps. The UNHCR got permission to play the Rolling Stones "Gimme Shelter" song to help their campaign starting last December. So, the Tour has the song playing in the background. You can watch the Google Earth Gimme Shelter Tour in the full desktop app (free GE 5 required), or you can watch it right here (via the embed a tour tool). Note, you can pause the tour at any point and zoom in to see more details - or read the placemarks. And, more importantly, you can click at the end to the "Donate" button. Watch and listen to it below - it only takes about 4 minutes:

In honor of World Refugee Day, all proceeds from Google Earth Blog from June 20th will be donated to the UNHCR. $100 can buy a survival kit for a refugee family. I hope other blogs will both embed this tour and donate their proceeds as well.

In 2007, Google did something similar by creating a layer highlighting what was happening to refugees in the Darfur region of Sudan through Google Earth. But, the technology of Google Earth has greatly improved since then. The tour above is broadening the scope of the message to include refugees around the world.

Posted by FrankTaylor at 7:52 AM | Comments (1)

June 15, 2009

Using Google Earth to Review Urban Development Project

Gerardo brought to my attention a post at the GEC about a proposed bridge construction project at the Columbia River in the Portland, Oregon and Vancouver, Washington region. The author, Nick Falbo, has produced some excellent Google Earth visualizations in opposition to the project. The visualizations use the new Tour function of Google Earth 5, and he's created embedded versions of the Tours on his blog. You can watch the three tours here - using the GE plugin in your browser, or visit his blog page to download the GE content directly. The tours include narration, 3D models of proposed bridges, and overlays to illustrate possible effects of the road project.

This is not at all the first time Google Earth has been used to visualize urban projects. Check here for some others:

Posted by FrankTaylor at 7:33 AM | Comments (1)

June 4, 2009

Making 3D for Google Earth, Google Seeking Help, KML Regions, OpenStreetMap in Google Earth

  • Making 3D for Google Earth - Google has produced this video on how to use SketchUp to make a 3D building for Google Earth. You can also get some good tips from the "Acceptance Criteria" for models uploaded to the 3D Warehouse in order to be added to the Google Earth 3D Buildings layer.

  • Google Seeking Help from Governments - Google continues to ask for help from official government sources to help improve their data in Google Maps and Google Earth. They want the data shown in these products to be as accurate and authoritative as possible. So, if you work for a governmental organization with authoritative data, and want to see your country's data better represented, you should contact Google.

  • KML Regions - GeoWeb Guru has posted an article about an advanced feature of KML called "Regions". The article was written by Geospatial Training Services which also offers Google Earth courses. Definitely worth a read. (Disclaimer: Geospatial Training Services currently advertises on GEB).

  • OpenStreetMap in Google Earth - Mapperz points out that you can not only view OpenStreetMap tiles as an overlay in Google Earth , but you can also put OpenStreetMap into GE on your browser using the Google Maps and Google Earth APIs. See his version here . A nice extra feature would be to enable a transparency slider so you can compare the two versions. You can do transparency with the overlay link above, in Google Earth itself, by selecting the loaded KML and using the transparency slider below the Places pane.

Posted by FrankTaylor at 8:24 AM | Comments (1)

May 29, 2009

Links: New 3D Tours Gallery, Earth API Update

Lots of interesting news buried below. If you're a hard core GE user, make sure you read closely and follow some of the links below. I don't have time today to do a more elaborate review of all the goodies below.

  • New 3D Tours Gallery - Yesterday Google announced a new addition to the Google Earth Gallery called "3D Buildings". This gallery shows some cool tours of 3D models around Google Earth for various categories. For example: castles, bridges, museums, baseball stadiums or skyscrapers. Most of these are Google Earth 5 Tours. Tours are a great way to help people see the wealth of 3D data available in Google Earth. I expect Google will be adding many of these 3D tours to the Tours Gallery for viewing them in the browser with the GE plugin. I do have a couple of suggestions for improvement though: 1) I think adding some sound and/or narration would make some of the tours better, and 2) The name "3D Buildings" needs to be changed - I've been saying for some time the layer in Google Earth should be changed because there are all kinds of non-3D Building models in the layer now (bridges, animals, buoys, ships, and more). Maybe the name of the layer (and this new gallery) should be "3D Objects".

  • Earth API Update - Yesterday at Google I/O Googler Roman Nurik presented a session called "Building Advanced 3D Geographical Applications for the Web with the Google Earth API". You can see his presentation documentation here. Virgil Zetterlind of EarthNC.com blogged his notes while attending the session at his Maplify blog. Of particular note is that updates to the Maps and Earth APIs have improved integration between the 2D and 3D maps so you can more seamlessly transition between the two modes. Here is a 30 second video demo of the transitions. Roman also has produced a "MyEarth" demo application that uses the Earth API and the Maps Data API to allow you to integrate content from you Google MyMaps to view it in the Earth Plugin. I recommend checking out Roman's presentation for links to other cool demos.

Posted by FrankTaylor at 8:06 AM | Comments (0)

More entries for this category:

  1. Where 2.0 - Day 1 - Workshops and Ignite - May 20, 2009
  2. Fantastic Free Google Earth Game: Ships - May 18, 2009
  3. Earthtwit - Combining Twitter with Google Earth Plugin - May 13, 2009
  4. KMLFactBook - A Data Visualization Tool with Google Earth - May 6, 2009
  5. Henry Hudson 400th Anniversary in Google Earth/Maps - May 4, 2009
  6. Swiss Fighter Video Synched - GE 5 Style - April 26, 2009
  7. Links: Ocean Now, Michigan Earth Day, Goldman Prize, Convention Center, Queen Mary - April 21, 2009
  8. 3D Tour of Tahina Expedition Catamaran - April 20, 2009
  9. USS New Jersey Battleship in 3D - April 16, 2009
  10. Synchronized YouTube with Google Earth Plugin - April 15, 2009
  11. Submarine Sim for Google Ocean - April 14, 2009
  12. Visualizing GPS Tracks for Trips with GE Plugin - April 13, 2009
  13. Simple Embedding of a Google Earth 5 Tour - April 10, 2009
  14. Why Google Earth 5 Tours in a Plugin Rock - April 9, 2009
  15. Introduction to Mars Tour with GE Plugin - April 7, 2009
  16. Touring with Google Earth Plugin - April 6, 2009
  17. New Google Earth 5 Plugin Released - April 1, 2009
  18. Home Made Street View for Google Earth - March 25, 2009
  19. Stereo 3D Views for Google Earth - March 23, 2009
  20. US Solar Jobs Map - March 11, 2009
  21. Links: Missing Atlantis, In the Navy, Predators Not Censored, Utrecht Building Plans, English Lake District - February 24, 2009
  22. CO2 Emissions Data Visualization in Google Earth - February 23, 2009
  23. Links: New Geo Developer Stuff, Embeddable GE Plugin Gadget, Google Earth Cache Basics, Mac Stuff - January 15, 2009
  24. Google Earth Surfing with Wii - January 9, 2009
  25. Happy Holidays from Google Earth Blog - December 23, 2008
  26. Google Earth Plugin Roundup - December 5, 2008
  27. Google Earth Plugin Available Now For Mac OS X - December 3, 2008
  28. Famous Tourist Sites in 3D - November 14, 2008
  29. Links: Location OS, GeoEye, Super Tour Mashup - November 10, 2008
  30. Google 3D Warehouse Adds Google Earth Plugin - November 7, 2008
  31. Frank Gehry Buildings in Google Earth - November 3, 2008
  32. WikiSailing - Flying/Sailing Sightseeing Tours in Google Earth - October 29, 2008
  33. Paragliding Simulator with Google Earth Plugin - October 23, 2008
  34. Terrain of Google Earth - Awesome Tour - October 22, 2008
  35. Enhancing Presentations with Google Earth - October 20, 2008
  36. Interior 3D Building Tour With Google Earth Plugin - October 13, 2008
  37. Budapest 3D Tour in Google Earth - October 11, 2008
  38. Worldwide Marine Protected Areas in Google Earth - October 7, 2008
  39. Earth Atlas - Google Earth Plugin Application - October 6, 2008
  40. Singapore Grand Prix Track in 3D - September 25, 2008
  41. Top 10 Games With Google Earth - September 24, 2008
  42. Real-time Satellites in Google Earth - September 8, 2008
  43. EarthGamz Using Google Earth Plugin - August 19, 2008
  44. 3D Driving Directions and Driving Simulator - August 12, 2008
  45. Google Earth Plugin Now Runs in Firefox 3 - June 22, 2008
  46. Easy Embedding of the Google Earth Plugin - June 20, 2008
  47. Roundup: Firefox 3 and Earth plugin, Google I/O, Spam Alert, Google Analytics - June 18, 2008
  48. Thematic Mapping Engine, Plugin - June 6, 2008
  49. Sweet! Bouncing Google Earth Plugin Animation with Controls - June 2, 2008
  50. Plugin Links: Singapore Tour, Tagzania, PhotoFlyr, EveryTrail, - June 1, 2008
  51. Google Earth Plugin Adopted Quickly - May 29, 2008
  52. Monster Milk Truck Game for Google Earth Plugin - May 28, 2008
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  • All image screenshots from Google Earth are Copyright Google