Tours Archives

Arctic Tern Tour | KMZ

For more, you can view all of their tours on the Encyclopedia of Life site.

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Posted by mickmel at 7:44 AM | Comments (1)

January 27, 2012

An amazing 3D tour of the Costa Concordia

Last week we showed you the fresh satellite imagery and tour of the wreck of the Costa Concordia. It was a great file that helped to show what happened, but now Peter Olsen (who just days ago unveiled the excellent Terra Nova models) has built an incredible 3D tour of the wreck, with the entire journey animated!

The speed has been increased to save time, so you don't have to wait 2-1/2 hours for it to finish, but it's otherwise as accurate as possible. To see it for yourself, simply visit the Costa Concordia Disaster Animation page in the Google 3D Warehouse and choose the "View in Google Earth" link.

If you're not familiar with using Tour files in Google Earth, simply click the "Double-click me!" text on the left to get it started, then click the play button at the bottom to step through the introductory slides, as seen here:

Fully animated tours like this are a great way to recreate events, and Peter is one of the best around at creating them. A similar example you might want to check out is his recreation of the 1977 Tenerife Airport disaster from a few years ago. Great job, Peter!

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Posted by mickmel at 7:09 AM | Comments (8)

January 19, 2012

Satellite imagery and 3D model of the cruise ship Costa Concordia

By now you've likely heard all about the wreck of the Costa Concordia, the cruise liner crashed off the Tuscan coast last Friday, killing at least 11 passengers.

DigitalGlobe has since captured aerial imagery of the site of the wreck, which can be found in their gallery or viewed below.

I've added that image to Google Earth as an image overlay, which you can view by downloading this KML file.

Another great way to view the ship is thanks to Paul van Dinther from PlanetInAction.com. A few years ago we showed you the amazing collection of cruise ships that Paul created for CleanCruising.com.au. One of the ships that Paul created for that project happened to be the Costa Concordia.

Since he had a 3D model of the ship and the skills to make some great tours, Paul put together this short video showing a bit about what happened.

Thanks to the generosity of the folks at CleanCruising.com.au, they've allowed Paul and PlanetInAction.com to release a full KMZ file of the stricken ship, which you can download in this KMZ file. Paul's model is amazingly accurate, and he includes various notes in the file to show the path of the ship.

Great work, Paul!

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Posted by mickmel at 8:05 AM | Comments (2)

January 6, 2012

Captain James Cook's circumnavigation of South Island, New Zealand

A few months ago, we showed you the awesome tour that Colin Hazlehurst put together of Captain James Cook's circumnavigation of North Island, New Zealand. Colin has now completed the tour of Cook's South Island circumnavigation, and it's equally impressive.

To see the file for yourself, simply download this KML file. Colin has also put together a blog showing Cook's day-by-day journal, which is pretty neat.

I encourage you to check out those links to learn more, and below is some info from Colin that tells more about this voyage that Cook made.

On February 9, 1770, Endeavour reached Cape Turnagain after completing the circumnavigation of North Island, New Zealand. Cook turned southward with the intention of sailing round Tovy Poenammu (South Island), a voyage which the people of Queen Charlotte's Sound had told him could be achieved in 3 or 4 days. The belief in this possibility persisted until 19Feb1770 when land was seen stretching off to the south-west, showing Cook that there was more to discover in that direction.

The voyage down the east side of the island identified the major features of the coast: Cape Campbell, Banks Island (actually a peninsula), Cape Saunders, and South Cape. On two occasions, exploratory trips were made away from the coast towards the south-east, in which direction people thought they could see land. What they saw turned out to be cloud which dissipated as the sun rose.

As when rounding North Cape on North Island, Endeavour was buffeted by storms and encountered strong swells as she rounded South Cape, and this convinced Cook that there was no land for a considerable distance to the south-west and that they had indeed reached the southernmost point of the land.

On the west coast they saw many of the bays that are now called the New Zealand Sounds, but were prevented from anchoring either by winds sweeping them past (Dusky Bay) or the uncertainty of being able to sail out at will (Doubtful Bay). There was much mist and fog as they explored this coast and typically they would hove to at night to avoid running aground.

Endeavour anchored for a few days in Admiralty Bay, not far from Queen Charlotte Sound. After refreshing the supplies of wood and water, Cook left the shores of New Zealand from Cape Farewell with the intention of exploring the east coast of New Holland (Australia).

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Posted by mickmel at 8:07 AM | Comments (2)

January 5, 2012

Great new 3D San Francisco site

After launching 3DHawaii and 3DLasVegas in the past few years, 3DTravel.com has just launched their ,3DSanFrancisco site and it's great!

I'm heading to San Francisco in a few months for Where 2.0, and I'm not familiar with the city, so it's been fun to use it to cruise around and check things out. While the San Francisco site isn't that much different from the Hawaii and Vegas sites, that's not necessarily a bad thing. It's clear that they've spent a lot of time plotting destinations, adding content, creating tours, and building all of the other items that make the sites so useful.

You can read more about the new site here and visit it for yourself at sanfrancisco.3dtravel.com.

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Posted by mickmel at 9:46 AM | Comments (1)

More entries for this category:

6. The Immortal Game of chess in 1851 - December 2, 2011
7. New visualizations of African dams - November 29, 2011
8. Captain James Cook's circumnavigation of New Zealand - November 28, 2011
9. A tribute to Steve Jobs in Google Earth - October 13, 2011
10. Animated flooding in London - October 10, 2011
11. See the Trip View Bowl in Google Earth - September 28, 2011
12. Google Earth 6.1 adds a few KML features - September 23, 2011
13. Preview your seats for Paul McCartney's Wrigley Field show by using Google Earth - July 29, 2011
14. Data Appeal: A new way to visualize data in Google Earth - July 27, 2011
15. Exploring Virtual Kenya - July 6, 2011
16. The Tour de France in Google Earth - July 5, 2011
17. Use Junctions to view your social content on a map - June 17, 2011
18. An amazing tour of the new U.S. Green Building Council headquarters - June 10, 2011
19. Some tips on building useful tours in Google Earth - June 6, 2011
20. 3D model of Joplin tornado debris - June 3, 2011
21. View the royal wedding procession in Google Earth - April 28, 2011
22. The Home Greenover Project - April 15, 2011
23. Share your ski trips with Google Earth - March 7, 2011
24. Walk the Red Carpet in Google Earth - February 26, 2011
25. Learn more about the US Presidents by using Google Earth - February 21, 2011
26. Cycling the Alps adds games, tours and much more - February 2, 2011
27. View the 2010 Hurricane Season in Google Earth - December 10, 2010
28. Street View imagery released in Romania - December 8, 2010
29. 3D Travel launches 3DLasVegas.com - December 7, 2010
30. Animated 3D models in Google Earth - November 23, 2010
31. US Navy Fleet Week in Google Earth - November 11, 2010
32. Visualize your GPS tracks with Breadcrumbs - November 3, 2010
33. Cycling the Alps with Google Earth - November 1, 2010
34. Some cool videos from Be Travellers using Google Earth - October 8, 2010
35. Excellent flight-tracking layer from FlightWise - September 17, 2010
36. Beautiful new 3D buildings in Las Vegas - September 10, 2010
37. Tour of the proposed Belo Monte Dam Complex - August 31, 2010
38. Using the track feature in Google Earth 5.2 - June 25, 2010
39. Google Earth 5.2 Released - June 14, 2010
40. New York's 9/11 Memorial now available in Google Earth - May 27, 2010
41. Amazing tour of the 1977 Tenerife Airport disaster - April 29, 2010
42. Hubble Tour for Google Earth - April 26, 2010
43. Running the Copper Canyon UltraMarathon - April 23, 2010
44. Using Google Earth on Earth Day - April 22, 2010
45. Ocean layer is now a default for all users - April 8, 2010
46. Some parts of the ocean are now high-resolution - February 4, 2010
47. A Climate Change Tour of Cold Places - February 2, 2010
48. Links: Burj Dubai, Historical Imagery Updates, Updated EveryTrail App - January 5, 2010
49. Links: Trikes in South Africa, 10K museums, 10 things to know - November 24, 2009
50. Google releases more tours to highlight climate change - October 6, 2009
51. Loop Links, Biodiversity and the Law of the Sea - September 30, 2009
52. Adding Audio to Google Earth Tours - September 18, 2009
53. Afghanistan News Overview in Google Earth - August 21, 2009
54. Google Earth Lesson Presentation - August 12, 2009
55. Best Google Earth Tour To Date: Apollo 11 - July 22, 2009
56. Look at the Moon in Google Earth - Available Now! - July 20, 2009
57. Snoovel - Google Earth Tour Creation and Hosting Site - July 7, 2009
58. North Shore City, New Zealand in Google Earth - July 2, 2009
59. New Places Site - Record Movie Postcards in Google Earth - June 22, 2009
60. Gimme Shelter Campaign via Google Earth - June 18, 2009
61. Using Google Earth to Review Urban Development Project - June 15, 2009
62. World Oceans Day, 3D Design Competition, Britain Archeological Site, New Imagery Tour Idea - June 8, 2009
63. Links: New 3D Tours Gallery, Earth API Update - May 29, 2009
64. Google Earth Outreach Upgrade - May 20, 2009
65. Swiss Fighter Video Synched - GE 5 Style - April 26, 2009
66. Formula One Circuit Tour - Car Simulation - April 24, 2009
67. Links: Ocean Now, Michigan Earth Day, Goldman Prize, Convention Center, Queen Mary - April 21, 2009
68. 3D Tour of Tahina Expedition Catamaran - April 20, 2009
69. Synchronized YouTube with Google Earth Plugin - April 15, 2009
70. Great Lakes Under Water Features Added To Google Earth - April 14, 2009
71. Simple Embedding of a Google Earth 5 Tour - April 10, 2009
72. Why Google Earth 5 Tours in a Plugin Rock - April 9, 2009
73. Introduction to Mars Tour with GE Plugin - April 7, 2009
74. Touring with Google Earth Plugin - April 6, 2009
75. New Google Earth 5 Plugin Released - April 1, 2009
76. Links: KML Research Winners, Tour Tutorial, Tour for Mountains, Mining Tour - March 13, 2009
77. Heli-Ski Tour in Google Earth - March 12, 2009
78. Google Earth 5 Tour Roundup - February 26, 2009
79. Links: Missing Atlantis, In the Navy, Predators Not Censored, Utrecht Building Plans, English Lake District - February 24, 2009
80. This Google Earth File Could Make you Sick - February 20, 2009
81. Google Earth 5 Record Tour Notes - February 18, 2009
82. Jimmy Buffet Helps Announce Google Earth 5 - February 5, 2009
83. Google Earth 5 - Initial Reactions - February 4, 2009
84. EveryTrail Supports New Tours for Google Earth 5 - February 3, 2009
85. Google Earth 5 - Record Tour Mode Features - February 2, 2009