Google Adds Satellite Imagery to Maps 661
Ant writes "BetaNews reports that Google quietly updated its maps service late Monday to include satellite imagery, a first in the industry... Much of Google Maps remains the same - just with detailed pictures from high-tech satellites instead of standard map graphics. Maps can be dragged to view adjacent areas, which means users do not have click and wait for graphics to reload. Zooming is also instantaneous with the help of a slider placed atop the map." The resolution doesn't seem very high, but the integration is very seamless.
Erm (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Erm (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Erm (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Erm (Score:5, Informative)
Go ahead, split hairs about aerial vs. satellite...
Re:Erm (Score:3, Funny)
My first guess would be hysterical paranoia about "national security".
Re:Erm (Score:3, Insightful)
I would think the reason was cost. The photos cost money to licence, cost money to store, and cost money to transmit. Mapquest is primarily a mapping/direction service. Adding photos didn't add much to their product, but added to their cost. My guess: It simply wasn't worth it.
More likely... (Score:3, Funny)
Cents, get it? I kill me.
Re:More likely... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:More likely... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Erm (Score:4, Insightful)
CNN covers the obscured images (Score:3, Informative)
See CNN [cnn.com] for good coverage of the issue.
Re:Erm (Score:3, Informative)
I'll blow any conspiracy theory with a counterexample
Of course, the White House and Capitol really are obscured, but it just proves that our elected representatives are paranoid. The DoD is obviously not scared of a few satellite photos. The big wigs there are probably thinking something along the lines of "you think that's cool? You should see our imagery!"
The reality of the situation is, they probably don't want to r
Re:Erm (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Erm (Score:3, Informative)
Bermuda's not part of the US (Score:3, Informative)
Canada is the exception, Google now considering it basically part of the US and so providing maps
Imagery sources (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Erm (Score:2, Informative)
Satelite photos have been available on the internet for some time, but this certainly makes them much more convenient.
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Re:Erm (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Erm (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Erm (Score:2)
So yeah... Google wasn't the first to offer it. I'll try and find out what website it was.
Mapquest had this ages ago (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Erm (Score:4, Interesting)
Indeed you're right. Multimap [multimap.com] has had aerial photos for a while... For example, this [multimap.com] is where I live! The Aerial photos are actually provided by Getmapping.com [getmapping.com]. The aerial photos aren't available for all locations, but certianly most of the UK is covered.
YMMV!
Re:Erm (Score:4, Funny)
Whoa. Can you actualy see the shadow of my mouse cursor???
Re:Erm (Score:4, Interesting)
Try getting directions, then change to satellite view. Your route is still overlayed perfectly over the roads you need to take, even though the images are slightly different than the vector map.
This is one of the coolest things I've ever seen. If it was possible to center the Google map based on lat/lon, just imagine how easy it would be to write a script that took input from your GPS and used it to scroll the map.
Re:Erm (Score:3, Informative)
For example...this is my friend's house..
http://maps.google.ca/maps?q=kelowna,bc&ll=49.937 7 32,-119.461716&spn=0.007693,0.010579&t=k&hl=en [google.ca]
Notice the &ll=49.937732,-119.461716 ? That is your lat/long.
You control zoom wiht the &spn but you cant go down all the way by entering in the url which sucks. At least i havent figured out how.
Re:Erm (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Erm (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Erm (Score:5, Funny)
Sounds like good technology for lots of uses (Score:5, Interesting)
I can imagine taking some very high resolution artwork and displaying it using this technology. I can zoom in to the max resolution or your can scroll around forever.
Anybody have any software that would take a large image file and apply a google-map-like interface to it? The software should be something as simple as:
If you are smart about your image naming conventions you shouldn't even need a powerful webserver. The whole thing could be served up via static files from a webserver with enough disk space and a big enough pipe.
I'd like to see this for things like:
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Re:Sounds like good technology for lots of uses (Score:5, Insightful)
- Resize the image to various resolutions
- Break the images into 200x200 pixel chunks at each resolution and save those chunks as individual image files
- Put a javascript interface on
Rather than working with fixed resolution images, you're must better off using wavelet compression [wikipedia.org] to store your images. As well as up to 50:1 compression ratios, you can easily stream out whatever resolution you need, without having to uncompress all the data first. ECW [es-geo.com] and related formats have been used by GIS [wikipedia.org] systems for many years, long before Google joined the party. Still, it's nice to see so much information publically available.I'm certainly looking forward to when Google add the UK data, so I don't have to rely on the limited service from GetMapping [getmapping.com]
Re:Sounds like good technology for lots of uses (Score:3, Informative)
The browser doesn't need to understand the wavelet format directly, it's fed image sections after they've been re-encoded in a suitable format (JPEG usually). GetMapping deals with the image in 250x250-pixel blocks on the browser side. They're extracted from a master ECW and converted to JPG images on the server side, then streamed back to a set position in the browser. The source URL for ea
Re:Sounds like good technology for lots of uses (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Goolge Watermarks (Score:5, Informative)
The Google images are not straight off of TerraServer. Actually to even say that perpetuates a misnomer. TerraServer is not a source of imagery. It simply serves public-domain USGS images which were created using our tax dollars. I'm not complaining, they are serving the public interest, but I'd be upset if they started putting watermarks on them or claiming copyright.
The Google images come from DigitalGlobe's QuickBird satellite. This is a private, for-profit corporation which raised enough money to put up their own satellite and start taking pictures which they are now selling on the open-market. I'm sure that their contract with Google necessitates the watermarks. Fair enough.
Re:Goolge Watermarks (Score:3, Interesting)
Different dataset from Keyhole (Score:5, Interesting)
No idea how much older, but it can't be more than a year or so.
Re:Different dataset from Keyhole (Score:5, Interesting)
We were already talking about this this morning on our local geocaching assocation forum. Two of us (St. Paul and Apple Valley, MN) show that the images are at least 4 years old or newer.
My house was built in 2001 and it shows it there. Google doesn't know my address and gives something nearby but I still can see the house
Dates to mid-2002 at my house (Score:5, Interesting)
The resolution is good enough that I can see the single stripe down the middle of a nearby two-lane highway. I can also see two cars and an 18-wheeler. The smallest visible object is a 4x8 sheet of plywood atop the shelter in my corral. I can also see my kennel concrete, which at that point is 15 feet wide, represented by 5 pixels on the saved image (you can pillage them via Moz's Page Info function). So there's the max resolution -- one pixel = about 3 feet (plus or minus some blurring).
Re:Different dataset from Keyhole (Score:3, Informative)
Meigs field is also still there, and the building I live in is just beginning construction (it was finished in late 2003 I believe).
Doug
Re:Different dataset from Keyhole (Score:2)
This would be a nice application for automated image processing, to match the different exposures at the image edges.
Re:Different dataset from Keyhole (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Different dataset from Keyhole (Score:3, Interesting)
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=14511+prism+circle+
Look to the right
Re:Different dataset from Keyhole (Score:3)
Take a look at the image [google.com] and you can derive the time easily... The white blob in the very middle at the top is our water tower. Makes a great sundial to get the time.
Then take the fact that this is a Seventh-day Adventist institution and I know by the fact that campus is empty except for the horde of cars at the church (the grey roofed structure just north of the road circle) that it is a Saturday.
Now... th
Comeon, 1 meter per pixel.... (Score:5, Informative)
Frankly most of what's available is only good for mapping, and that isn't that good at best. Most of the images have been jpg'd to the point that an 8x8 block is destroying what little detail is available.
For example, 8x8 blocked JPG at 10 meters per pixel is a boatload of image data lost.
And yes, I work with Satellite imagery.
Re:Comeon, 1 meter per pixel.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Frankly, I don't really want more than that accessible to the masses.
Re:Comeon, 1 meter per pixel.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Region of Waterloo -- 10cm Resolution (Score:4, Interesting)
http://locator.region.waterloo.on.ca/ [waterloo.on.ca]
(warning - I have only seen it work in IE).
The region of Waterloo (ON, CAN) has aerial photography at 10cm resolution (~4in) in B&W for 2000 and 2003. I've been looking for a house, and this is a really great site for checking out the state of yards without visiting them. You can see trees, fences, the size of driveways, if the house is going to be in the shadow of an apartment building . .
I honestly have no issue with 10cm resolution being available to the general public. No tin foil on my head.
Re:Comeon, 1 meter per pixel.... (Score:5, Interesting)
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Kramer+Junction,CA&
Scroll east to see a huge compass rose painted in desert.
Re:Comeon, 1 meter per pixel.... (Score:3, Interesting)
The Boneyard [google.com] a few miles away from my house.
Pan west... that's a crapload of planes.
Wow (Score:2)
First in the industry??? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:First in the industry??? (Score:5, Informative)
No, you're wrong, the multimap is much more detailed and better looking than google's :-) (as well as being able to display the map at the same time as the image).
Re:First in the industry??? (Score:5, Informative)
The Swiss mapping site map.search.ch [search.ch] does have satellite images since a long time.
Here a sample link map.search.ch/etoy [search.ch] of my village. Click more to zoom in !
Markus
Re:First in the industry??? (Score:3, Informative)
So, no, not new.
Bigger world (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Bigger world (Score:3, Funny)
First? (Score:5, Informative)
Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten [aftenposten.no] have had this on their map-service for almost a year now. At any time in the map-search you can switch between a vector-based map and the satellite images. Very neat
hmmm.... (Score:2, Insightful)
What about MultiMap? Not really "new" (Score:4, Informative)
How is this really "new" - in fact, MultiMap has an even cooler feature, which uses a Java applet to overlay the photos with the map, so the area your mouse is over gets a photo superimposed over it.
The only advantage Google has that I can see is a higher free resolution - if you want high res photos on Multimap, you have to pay.
Re:What about MultiMap? Not really "new" (Score:2)
Nah, on Google I zoomed in on New York. It stopped when long island took up the whole screen, no further zooming was possible. So, you can't see to the street level it would seem, which you get on Multimap for free.
Re:What about MultiMap? Not really "new" (Score:2)
Nah right back at you. When I zoomed in to my street address I could see one of my neighbors mowing his lawn and individual shrubs in my front lawn.
It is much higher res than the free access Multimap.
wow... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:wow... (Score:4, Informative)
But when will the rest of the world be included (Score:2)
If you try looking east from NY or west from LA you just get endless blue ocean. Hello... Hello... This is the rest of the world calling!
Re:But when will the rest of the world be included (Score:5, Informative)
Hi this is Google
Our software is in beta
Please do not criticize it until we say you can
Sincerely,
Google
Re:But when will the rest of the world be included (Score:2)
My 3 y/o neighborhood does not even have streets. (Score:2, Interesting)
scary (Score:2)
You made the wrong selection in the year dropdown. That brown field is how your neighborhood will look in 2007.
Not an industry first by many years... (Score:2, Interesting)
Not a first. (Score:5, Informative)
varying seasons (Score:5, Funny)
link (Score:5, Interesting)
I think this is more disturbing (Score:3, Funny)
Re:varying seasons (Score:5, Interesting)
Watermarks (Score:2)
Anyway, this is really nice. To be able to switch between traditional line-art mode and imagery. It's neat to do something like a text search on a hospital and then switch to image m
Not blocking? (Score:3, Informative)
White house:
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=1600+Pennsylvania+A
Pentagon:
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=2+South+Rotary+Road
Re:Not blocking? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Not blocking? (Score:5, Interesting)
Wow! (Score:2, Funny)
And still no scale. (Score:5, Insightful)
Great googly-moogly. Stop with cheap low-res sat photos and try adding a scale to your maps. You know, one of the basic features of a map? The little hashed bar that gives me some idea how far it is from one point on the map to another. I realize it is not innovative or amazingly cool, but it kinda renders your maps useless otherwise.
Hide and Seek (Score:3, Funny)
High-interest targets obscurred? (Score:4, Interesting)
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=constitution+ave+an
It's the same with KeyHole as well (screenshot):
http://www.allbootdisks.com/images/keyhole.jpg [allbootdisks.com]
Is keyhole doing this to all 'sensitive' targets?
Maps are blocking Industrial Zones (Score:3, Interesting)
http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=43.198586,-77.6302
Notice the big fuzzy section. I used to work there and can tell you that that is Kodak Park (well, whats left of it as Kodak Management lays off the workforce, moves the operations to China, then demolishes the buildings- more layoffs next week).
The entire region is blurred out and unusable, so that you can't see into it.
What I'd like to know is whether or not this is common for other areas (anyone know lat/long of an oil refinery?) and other areas of key civil importance.
Otherwise maybe Kodak doesn't want them spying
First in Industry? (Score:3, Informative)
Wait a minute... (Score:3, Funny)
Zoom Annoyance (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Example (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Example (Score:5, Informative)
Look for the "Map - Satellite" in the top right corner and click Satellite.
Re:Example (Score:4, Interesting)
--Phil.
Great fun with satellite imaginery (Score:3, Interesting)
Rather nice if you want to plan a trip, too, as you get an idea how things look like along the way! And if the resolution gets better in distant future, who will need to do the actual trip anyway?
If a service like this really becomes popular, it has vast potential - just zoom to where you are, and y
Re:I do not see any change (Score:3, Interesting)
Satelite photo of the whitehouse [google.com] - on Google maps
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Re:I do not see any change (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I do not see any change (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I do not see any change (Score:3, Interesting)
You're both quite correct. See the SecurityFocus article "Secret Service airbrushes aerial photos [securityfocus.com]". Note that the link to the old vs new images has changed since the article was written - they're now here [eyeball-series.org]. You might notice a remarkable similarity between a couple of the retouched pictures and Google's White House imagery.
Re:y0z (Score:5, Funny)
Sand in Central Park (Score:5, Informative)
Without looking, I am guessing that if the patches are vaguely fan-shaped, they are baseball/softball/etc diamonds. I've seen these on many other air photos.
Re:Come ON, Google! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Come ON, Google! (Score:4, Interesting)
Comic Book Guy's answer: "As a viewer, I feel they owe me."
if you don't like the free service google offers, you said it yourself - mapquest already does it apparently. AND... it's 3 fewer letters to type in than maps.google.com. So there's your answer.
Re:Area 51? (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually I can see it! (Score:3, Funny)
I really wonder wh###CARRIER LOST
Transparency (Score:3, Informative)
Search for a big city. I've only tried Brussels.
There's a Transparency slider at the top left.
Mappy has had satellite maps with transparency for at least a few months. It has been truly interactive for ages. I have no idea why nobody's mentioned this, and why anybody thinks Google's US-only, slow, hardly interactive maps are any good at all.