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October 27, 2009

Outreach and the heroes of Google Earth

Since introducing Google Earth Outreach a few years ago, Google has worked hard to expand the program. Google Earth Outreach enabled any organization to quickly and easily get the resources it needs to create compelling stories through Google Earth. They've added three new projects today, all based in Africa: Save the Elephants (KML ), Mapping Africa's Protected Areas (KML ) and UNEP has created the Uganda Atlas of Our Changing Environment. You can learn more about these and other Outreach projects in the Google Earth Outreach Showcase or visit the new Google Earth Outreach in Africa page. Here is a brief video overview of their Outreach program:

Today Google also unveiled the first five members of their "Heroes Project". These are organizations and individuals that have "used Google Earth in their efforts to affect change". They include:

• Project Kaisei, which is tracking the Pacific garbage patch and we've showcased previously


• Save the Elephants, which also happens to be part of Google Earth Outreach


• Borneo Orangutan Survival, tracking the decreasing Orangutan population


• Chief Almir and the Surui, which tracks illegal logging


• Appalachian Voices, which fights against mountaintop coal removal and we first told you about more than two years ago. For more about them, you can watch the video below:

Google has created their Heroes program to inspire others to "use Google Earth to make the world a better place". If you know of an organization that's worthy of being considered a Google Earth Hero, you can nominate them here.

Posted by mickmel at 9:36 AM | Comments (1)

October 26, 2009

3D plane in flight in 3D Buildings layer

A sharp-eyed GEB reader named 'Will' has discovered something pretty cool. At the north end of the Amsterdam Airport Schiphol, the Netherlands' main airport, there is a 3D model of an airplane coming in for a landing. The plane was modeled by 'KG800'. You can view the plane using this KML file . Be sure to have the "3D Buildings" layer turned on.

As far as we know, this it the first 3D plane included in the main "3D Buildings" layer. However, there are been plenty of planes added via third-party KML files before. There was a 3D Plane Tracker we showed a few years ago, the Wirefly X Prize Cup Event, and even an aircraft carrier that you can use with the flight simulator mode.

For normal satellite imagery of airplanes, you can browse this collection of planes in flight, a Lancaster Bomber from a few years ago, or a U-2 Spyplane discovered earlier this year. If you still want more, Google Earth Hacks has nearly 300 planes in their "aircraft in flight" category, and more than 900 "aircraft on the ground". You can even find tons of aircraft in Google StreetView: 121 in flight, or 283 on the ground.

All of that being said, it's still really cool to see a built-in 3D model of a plane in Google Earth. If you find others, please let us know.

[UPDATE 26-OCT: GEB reader 'Tom' just let us know that there are a few 3D planes parked at London Heathrow. I've created a KML file for you to check them out. Let us know if you find others.]

[UPDATE #2 26-OCT: GEB reader 'Christoph' pointed out that there's a second plane at Schiphol that we missed. You can view it here ]

Posted by mickmel at 8:54 AM | Comments (9)

October 23, 2009

Your 3D buildings arrive in Google Earth and Shelter Competition winners announced

Google is just about to push out their weekly 3D building update, your some of your buildings might be in there! They've added thousands of user-generated buildings from people using the slick new Building Maker tool. Also, be sure to check out the models they've chosen for their Best of Building Maker collection, as it showcases some very nice models.

[UPDATE 24-OCT: The new buildings are now live in Google Earth. Also, as pointed out by 'WLKPman', Budapest, Hungary was updated with a full city of autogenerated 3D buildings. Good find!]

Google often releases new auto-generated 3D cities as well (Melbourne and Lyon last week, Antwerp and Portage before that), but no word on new cities today (yet). If you find any other new 3D cities, be sure to let us know.

In addition, back in June Google announced a contest called the Design It: Shelter Competition. The goal was for participants to "create a simple shelter for a specific geographic location anywhere in the world". The competition has ended and the winners were announced on the Google LatLong blog. The winning models can be found in the Google 3D Warehouse for viewing in Google Earth.

The People's Prize: CBS - Cork Block Shelter [3D Warehouse]
The Juried Prize: SeaShelter [3D Warehouse]

The short video below highlights the winning submissions.

Posted by mickmel at 1:50 PM | Comments (3)

October 22, 2009

KML file that shows the October imagery, now updated in Google Maps

A few readers have pointed out that Google has posted the monthly KML file showing the updated imagery from a few days ago. Google has also posted an entry that gives the full details of the update.

In addition, Google Maps has now been updated with the imagery from this latest update. Along with the new imagery, Google has added a nifty "Real Estate" layer to Google Maps. Click the "More" button at the top of the screen and choose "Real Estate". You'll see hundreds of markers appear in the USA and Australia, with options to filter on the left side of the screen. This data is not yet available in Google Earth, but I'd expect we'll likely see a layer for it in the future.

Having this information in Google Earth would be wonderful. By toggling various layers, you could view a particular home in relationship to nearby schools, churches, businesses, etc. It could be very useful. We'll keep an eye on it and let you know if we hear anything.

Posted by mickmel at 1:55 PM | Comments (1)

October 21, 2009

Links: New Panaramio app, Thematic Mapping, ARsights, Disaster Relief, First Pics from WorldView-2

Panoramio launches iPhone app: The team at Panoramio has just released their first iPhone app (iTunes link), to allow you to quickly upload photos directly from your phone. It's a very simple app -- open it, log in, and upload. New Panoramio images are pushed to Google Earth on a regular basis, so this is a simple way to add geo-referenced photos to Google Earth.

However, the app doesn't allow you to view existing photos or browse for photos near you. For that, you'll need to use an existing app such as Layar and have it pull the Panoramio photos into it. I'd expect a future update will have more features along those lines.

Using KML for Thematic Mapping: Bjørn Sandvik has just released his research paper on Thematic Mapping as a free PDF download. In his word: A thematic map displays the spatial pattern of a social or physical phenomenon, such as population density, life expectancy or climate change. The paper (PDF) provides an in-depth look at thematic mapping, while the link above gives a nice overview of the thesis.

ARSights: We discussed InGlobe technologies earlier in the year when they released their slick Augmented Reality program. Using your web cam, you could virtually show a 3D model on your desk. It was a neat program, but had some shortcomings: Windows only, and it only had a few 3D models to use. They've now built a Mac version of their program and introduced ARSights to hook into the Google 3D Warehouse to let you use any of the models in there. Below is a quick video to show how the process works:

Powerful IT for disaster relief: Earlier this month, Google held a day of workshops in Washington for over 20 various humanitarian organizations, to share ideas on how to improve humanitarian and relief efforts when disaster strikes. They covered a lot of topics, using tools such as Google Earth and Google Map Maker to handle various situations. You can read the full recap on the Google LatLong Blog.

First Images from WorldView-2 Satellite: Just twelve days after its launch, the first images from DigitalGlobe's WorldView-2 Satellite are available. The first images are of a few locations in San Antonio, Texas, where the GeoInt 2009 Symposium will be held this week. The images look very crisp, and the quality is expected to improve as refinements and calibrations are made to the system. Below is an image that the WV2 captured of Dallas Love Airport. (via SlashGeo)

Posted by mickmel at 11:29 AM | Comments (0)

October 20, 2009

New Google Earth Imagery - October 20

We've received and verified a report of new imagery in a few places around the world. At this point, we don't yet know the scope of the update.

The new imagery is not yet visible in Google Maps, so to help find areas that have been updated simply compare the imagery in Google Earth with the imagery from the same location in Google Maps. If they're different, that means the imagery in Google Earth is new. If you find a new area, please leave a comment below and let us know.

UPDATED: Google has just posted their monthly quiz on the LatLong Blog. Check it out and see what areas you can discover.

New and updated imagery [UPDATED 21-OCT 07:23 ET]

• Algeria: Thanks 'Jonas'


• Argentina: Goya and Reconquista - Thanks 'McMaster_de'


• Bolivia: Southern part of the country - Thanks 'Thilo'


• Brazil: Including Belo Hoizonte, Maraba and Rondonopolis - Thanks 'Jonas' and 'McMaster_de'


• China: Northern part of the country - Thanks 'Steven'


• Estonia: Thanks 'Cristi'


• Iceland: Thanks 'Thilo'


• India: Mumbai - Thanks 'Munden'


• Indonesia: Surabaya - Thanks 'okasbali'


• Kazakhstan


• Laos: Southern part of the country - Thanks 'Donalbain'


• Latvia


• Libya


• Lithuania


• Mozambique: Most of the country - Thanks 'Antonia'


• Niger


• Poland: Most of the country appears to be updated, aside from major cities


• Romania: Cluj and Brasov - Thanks 'Cristian' and 'Twist3r'


• Russia: Various locations - Thanks 'McMaster_de'


• Sri Lanka: Hambantota, Trincomalee and a few other areas - Thanks 'McMaster_de' and 'Martin'


• Sudan


• United Kingdom: Blackburn, EastBourne, Southern Wilkshire, West Yorkshire - Thanks 'Munden', 'Ozybolairy' and 'Damien'


• United States: Areas of Texas along the Coastline (Corpus Christi, south of Houston, among others) and parts of North Carolina


• Uruguay: Central part of the country - Thanks 'JP'

Posted by mickmel at 3:45 PM | Comments (36)

More 3D buildings appear around the globe

It's been yet another big day for 3D buildings in Google Earth. Google has pushed out a major update to Melbourne, Australia and Lyon, France, blanketing the cities with photorealistic 3D buildings. Below is a nice shot of Melbourne with the new buildings.

In addition to that, CyberCity3D has added about 25,000 gray buildings along the California coastline in the cities of El Segundo, Manhattan Beach and Hermosa Beach as part of Google's Cities in 3D Program. You can fly directly to those cities using this KMZ file. Be sure to turn on the both the 3D Buildings and the Terrain layers to view these buildings.

If you're not familiar with the Cities in 3D program, which was introduced last fall, you can visit their site or watch the video below.

Posted by mickmel at 9:44 AM | Comments (0)

October 19, 2009

Get your home or business modeled in 3D for Google Earth

There are many businesses out there that would like to see their office rendered in 3D in Google Earth, but can't make it happen. Perhaps they don't have the time or talent to play with Google SketchUp, and Google's new Building Maker doesn't cover their area. What to do? There are a number of enterprising companies that are offering their services, and we thought we'd point a few of them out to you. These companies have all had their work featured on this blog in the past, and seem like good places to start.

The first is concept3D, which just opened their new Self Service site to the public. They allow you to choose what kind of work you need done and they create a custom quote for you automatically. We've written about their models before (such as the recent Boston University rendering), and they appear to do excellent work. Their prices seem to be very reasonable, though there isn't a lot to compare them to.

Another big alternative is CyberCity3D, who offer separate Residential and Commercial services. Like concept3D, we've written about CC3D a few times in the past (such as the models they added last month). They also appear to do excellent work, though they don't list any prices on their site.

Finally we have Gerardo Paz, who runs GeoDataMaps (and also translates the GEB in Spanish). He built the incredible 3D version of Frank's Tahina catamaran, which can be seen here. You can visit his site for more information or to get started.

Posted by mickmel at 9:14 AM | Comments (1)

October 16, 2009

3D buildings in Antwerp, Portage, and your buildings are coming soon

The Google SketchUp team just released another nice batch of 3D buildings. Along with a variety of new models from the 3D Warehouse, they've added a ton of grey buildings in Antwerp, Belgium (thanks for the tip Nick!) and Portage, Michigan. A few months ago, Google showcased a few excellent 3D modelers that were building out a large portion of Antwerp. Having the new gray buildings to surround their models really helps bring the city to life.

The SketchUp team posts these updates each week, using models that they've approved during the previous week. I'd expect they'll begin to approve some Building Maker models this week, which means they might start appearing in Google Earth as early as next week.

Another minor update this week is the Disney World area (our original review | video tour). Some buildings had gone missing which have now reappeared, and some other models have been slightly cleaned up. The best part of Disney 3D is Google Earth 5.1. Because of the incredible level of it detail, it used to require a very powerful computer to handle it at a decent framerate. With the speed enhancements in Google Earth 5.1, Disney performs much better and it's a neat place to fly around with your kids.

Posted by mickmel at 10:32 AM | Comments (3)

October 15, 2009

Tunneling under the city of Mecca

The city of Mecca is an interesting place. Because of its position in a narrow valley, they've had to work hard to continue to expand the transportation system over the years.

As a result, many tunnels have been built under the city to handle both pedestrians and vehicles. While you can can see many of the tunnel entrances in Google Earth, it can be difficult to determine where they all lead. A handful of users in the Google Earth Community (led by "Diane9247", with help from various others) have been mapping out the tunnels to try to determine where they all lead. The thread is an interesting read, and you can view the results of their work in this KMZ file (shown below).

During the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, where roughly three million pilgrims travel to the city, the capacity of the tunnels becomes very tight. Over the years there have been a number of tragic incidents, typically caused by a stampede of people. This file really showcases just how immense the network of tunnels has become.

[UPDATE: As some of you pointed out, between the time this mapping started and now, updates to the Google Earth road layer made much of this work obsolete. However, it's still a nice testament to their hard work, and they point out a few additional areas that road data doesn't cover. It'll be real neat once StreetView covers the area!]

Posted by mickmel at 3:44 PM | Comments (4)