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October 30, 2009

Happy Halloween! Turn Google Earth into a giant pumpkin

A few years ago, Frank Taylor made a cool pumpkin overlay for Google Earth. It's still a fun toy to play with, so we're showing it off again. To make it work, simply download the KML here and that's it!

For maximum benefit, turn off the atmosphere ("View -> Atmosphere") and the "Borders & Labels" (found in the "Layers" on the left side of your Google Earth window).

The pumpkin was created using a simple image overlay that he wrapped around the globe, then added a 3D model for the stem. You can read details on how that's done in his post from last year.

If you want more, you can check out a bunch of Halloween goodness in the Google 3D Warehouse or maybe check out the "Pumpkin Man" in Google StreetView, found in the Disney Resort in Paris.

Happy Halloween!

Posted by mickmel at 3:26 PM | Comments (1)

October 29, 2009

New 3D Buildings Released; Keep up With Geo News on Twitter

According to the Google 3D Warehouse Twitter account (@3DWH), the weekly push of 3D buildings has just gone out. No word yet on what those updates are, but presumably they've added many more of the Building Maker models. In my case, the number buildings they've accepted has gone up from 5 to 18 in the past week, so they seem to be working very hard to post those. Have any of yours shown up yet?

If you find any new 3D cities, please let us know. [Update 29-Oct: There are apparently no new 3D cities, but enjoy all of the new buildings!]

Also, Twitter has just started rolling out their new "lists" feature, and it can be a great way to keep up with all things Google Earth. Lists are a new way to follow groups of people, without necessarily having to "follow" them. Just pull up the page and see the latest tweets from the people in the list. Below are few Google Earth-related lists that might be worth checking out. They all have the same type of content, but vary in size; choose the list that's appropriate for how much time you want to invest in reading all of the tweets.

(note: You'll need to be logged into Twitter to see the lists.)

-- @davetroy/geo (following 13)
-- @mickmel/geo (following 23)
-- @brady/geo (following 91)
-- @jasonbirch/geo (following 193)

Any other great geo lists out there we should mention?

If lists aren't your thing, you can always just follow this site (@gearthblog), Frank (@franktaylor), me (@mickmel) or Google's official Google Earth account (@googleearth).

Posted by mickmel at 3:31 PM | Comments (0)

October 28, 2009

A closer look at Africa

Yesterday we told you about a variety of organizations that Google is showcasing, both through their Google Earth Outreach and their Heroes Project. One of the organizations, MAPA (Mapping Africa's Protected Areas) was featured more in-depth on Google's blog today.

MAPA's March Turnbull has provided a deeper look at what MAPA is all about. Their goal is to make sure no one can say "We never knew!" when it comes to keeping African parks and wildlife in the public eye. Through their comprehensive KML file , you can view the major parks, reserves and protected areas in Southern and Eastern Africa. They plan on adding thousands more parks and other data in the future, and continue to build this already valuable resource.

A semi-related item comes from Google Maps Mania, where they showcase a photo safari tour that Soren Johannessen created of J. Michael Fay's African imagery. Fay spent more than a year flying 70,000 miles in a small plane at low altitude over Africa, taking photos every twenty seconds, as part of his MegaFlyover project. Many of those extraordinary images can be found in Google Earth, and the tour that Soren created is a neat way to highlight those. You can view the tour here using the Google Earth Plug-in. It takes a while to load, so it's recommended that you have a fast connection. Alternatively, you can download the KMZ file to view it directly in Google Earth.

Posted by mickmel at 9:29 AM | Comments (0)

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)

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