Huge Google Earth update

[Kullat Nunu]

It appears Google Earth received a huge update last night (see Google Earth blog (http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2006/06/huge_database_u.html)). Large areas in Russia, China, Africa, South America, Australia, New Zealand etc. have now very high resolution aerial photos, even over rural and desert areas.

See for example the Tunguska Event location in Siberia (60°54'05" N, 101°53'46" E) if there is any fallen trees visible anymore...

[Frog march]

have you seen the google moon and the google mars sites?
they only have strips of the moon and mars at the moment but they are pretty good.

[Kullat Nunu]

On the Google Mars site they use Viking data for visible light maps and Mars Odyssey IR data for infrared maps... It would be great if they added Mars Global Surveyor images into it, but the high resolution images by MGS tend to suffer from the lack of context.

I don't quite understand what you mean by "strips of the moon" -- the map used on the Google Moon map is an airbrushed map by USGS. Hopefully they replace it with Clementine and Lunar Orbiter data. The current map is more like a joke (try zooming all the way down).

The Google Earth release will be eventually added into the Google Maps site, by the way.

[Kullat Nunu]

Interestingly, almost all the places I've visited have now high resolution images. In April, I visited Antalya, Kemer and Pamukkale/Hierapolis in Turkey -- they all have high resolution images now. Before my trip, Kemer wasn't even marked on the map.

An unfortunate exception is Santorini in Greece, which still hasn't got any better resolution.

Krakatau hasn't been improved, either. Looks like the Bear Island between Norway and Spitsbergen isn't on the map at all, even though its place names are marked!

Most of the Main Island in Hawaii is now covered with high resolution images. Mauna Kea summit is also covered -- sadly there's a gap exactly where most of the telescopes are located. Half of one of the Keck telescopes is partly visible. I think the large telescope visible is Subaru Telescope.

[Kullat Nunu]

Puerto Rico is one of the places updated, and Arecibo Observatory looks now much better. Surface evelation data fails at that point and shows it as a hill instead of a valley, though.

[mickal555]

Cool! I look forward to being able to zoom fully in on brissie!

Google earth is beyond my laptops capibility...

[Lance]

Is there any way in Google Earth to tell the date a particular area was imaged on?

[Kullat Nunu]

No. That's a function Google Earth really should have.

[mickal555]

Yeah! I've been trying for ages to find the date for my area... they are at least 2yrs old from what I can tell... but my memory of when landmarks changed isn't thtat good...

[Kullat Nunu]

I downloaded the new Google Earth 4 beta... There is a new layer called "DG Coverage"... Enable it and you see what places are imaged and when (by whom?) and the cloud cover there. Looks like Google uses mostly images that have 10% or less cloud cover. Oldest high resolution images are from 2002.

Several US states and the whole Germany have high resolution images from other sources.

As usual, looks like that the Northern Europe has been neglected... The few places that have high resolution photos are often cloudy and have been taken in winter in shallow light angles...

On a brighter side, National Geographic content has been updated to include the North America.

[JohnD]

" Large areas in Russia, China, Africa, South America, Australia, New Zealand etc." now in hi-res. Hoo-bl**dy-ray!
When will they get around to hires in Great Britain?

Above a line from the top of Morecambe Bay to Kingston-upon-Hull, it's all misty Celtic (or Cumbrian, or Scots) twilight, except for some major cities. There's not that much there, but a d*mn sight more than in Tunguska, or the great Australian Outback.

Love & Kisses
John

[Lianachan]

Microsoft Live Local (http://local.live.com/) still has higher res images of most of the places I'm interested in. Between that and Google Earth, most places I want to look at are covered.

[mickal555]

Have they updated or are they going to update google maps(satalight)?

[Nonkers]

How often are the Google Earth satellite pictures of eg France updated on the internet? Daily? Weekly?

[Frog march]

i think that is more like once, ie pictures from 4 years ago, and maybe they'll do it again when they have better ones.

[jkmccrann]

Well, there's no great change, or any change at all that I could spot, to the coverage of Melbourne on the maps I've seen. Have to check out the Microsoft offering.

Nup, nowhere near as good resolution on the Microsoft offering as compared to Google's. Orders of magnitude less precision.

[publiusr]

Oh well.

[jt-3d]

Just had a look at my house again and it seems that they have lowered the resolution. It's the same images though because that junk car is still sitting in my driveway. Yes, I may be a redneck.

[jkmccrann]

Well, just checked back just now and there has definitely been an improvement to the resolution of Google Earth over Melbourne and Fiji.

I can only assume this is related to the original update mentioned here, but for whatever reason this update was not immediately accessible at least from where I am - perhaps because what I was looking at was residing cached on a localised server somewhere?

Not sure, but for whatever reason it was delayed, it is definitely fully accessible from Australia now. Fiji is looking really good as well.

:)

[Argos]

The new hi res images of my area are at least 2 years old. But they´re cool.

[lti]

before this update NZ had only one small strip of hires images. Now that same strip is a wonderfully hires shot of clouds.

at least there is now far better coverage of the rest of the country.

[mickal555]

Still can't zoom in all the way on google maps on brisbane(1 off) oh well...

[tlbs101]

Last week, I was showing google earth for the first time to someone who is very close to me, and who shall remain unnamed. We were at my sister-in-law's house, and of course that is what we "zoomed in" on, first. It was late in the evening and getting dark. I knew that the imagery was probably from fall of 2004 based on my personal observations.

Purely by coincidence, my brother-in-law's truck was parked outside on the street, as it was at the time the satellite took the photos (normally it would be parked a mile away, or across the street).

The person to whom I was showing the imagery exclaimed, "Wow, they can see at night?", before I could explain the images were almost 2 years old.

It was terribly difficult to hold my laughter inside.

[Trebuchet]

Are they adding the new hi-res incrementally? When the thread first appeared, I immediately went looking for my vacation home (Port Townsend, WA) but it was still lo-res. Yesterday that was still the case but hi-res had been extended to about a mile south. I don't think that was the case a couple of weeks ago.

[jkmccrann]

Are they adding the new hi-res incrementally? When the thread first appeared, I immediately went looking for my vacation home (Port Townsend, WA) but it was still lo-res. Yesterday that was still the case but hi-res had been extended to about a mile south. I don't think that was the case a couple of weeks ago.

Given my experience, you could quite well be onto something there, but I obviously have no idea.

[AA Institute]

I wonder if they've updated rural Bangladesh yet? I'd love to see the village region in Sylhet where I was roamin' around as a kid back in the 1970s :)

AA
http://www.myspace.com/aa_spaceagent

[ungreat]

Everywhere around us is hi res,except our city,Peterborough!

[mugaliens]

A lot of the images aren't from satellites, but are from USGS and other mapping agencies who take and sell aerial photos for a variety of reasons, including population estimates, compliance with by-laws/covenants (such as putting in your back lawn, a requirement in many SW communities), etc.

[JohnD]

Do you remember the 'Face on Canada'?
Just revisited and there's a great 'label' next to it, saying "Image not found".

????????????????????

Still no reports from anyone whose actualy been there.
This makes me believe in the Face even less.

See: 50deg 00' 30.8"N 110deg 06' 47.28W

John

[Trebuchet]

Google Earth seems to have experienced a huge downgrade since Friday. Major areas of formerly at least so-so resolution are now no resolution at all, at least for me. Take a look at Everett, WA to see what I mean.

Edit: Well, never mind. It was working for the guy next to me so I exited and came back in. Now it's fine, or at least as it was before. Why did it do that?

[Mellow]

John,

just looked at the Face in Canada.... thanks for the link.... Has Hoagland seen this???

[LurchGS]

Edit: Well, never mind. It was working for the guy next to me so I exited and came back in. Now it's fine, or at least as it was before. Why did it do that?

Obviously it hates you :) It's trying to drive you nuts

(I took a look at my house .. old photo. From at least 5 years ago - probably more, based on the trees) - what's interesting is that other areas - a mile or so away, are much more recent

[Trebuchet]

After the edit, I looked a little more and found that other areas which had been okay the first time were now fuzzed out. I really don't understand this. It's been fine since then, however.

[Kullat Nunu]

New huge update.

On October 3rd, we updated Google Maps and Google Earth with the following new imagery:

- the whole state of Minnesota, South Carolina, North Dakota, Missouri (updated to 2005), Idaho, Maryland, and now full coverage for the entire state of Texas
- Updates to Florida (most of the state covered now)
- 15 high-resolution cities in Germany
- update for London, 2006 data at 10cm from Bluesky
- South Georgia Island (courtesy of the British Antarctic Survey)
- Albany, OR; Lubbock, TX; Port Townsend, WA; Portage County, OH; Trumball County, OH
- 32 Digital Globe Citisphere cities (updates and new coverage)

In addition there was a significant update to the regular Digital Globe imagery all over the world.

There was another update a while ago, which included cities in Europe and United States and complete coverages of California and Netherlands and more.

[Kullat Nunu]

Google Earth was developed from Keyhole, a commercial program which had 30 days free trial. I remember it was awesome to see individual cars in London. With this new release even pedestrians are easily discernible. The imaging time seems to be well after noon, so everyone have long shadows.

[Trebuchet]

Port Townsend, WA! I was so thrilled to see it added that I had to launch GE immediately and take a look. And disappointed to see that they STILL haven't extended the hi-res area to my house just a few miles from town. :(

[Kullat Nunu]

Surprisingly enough, my home is visible in high resolution. It is located in one of the few high-resolution patches in my country. Unfortunately it is located under a cloud shadow and the image is taken in early spring when ground was still covered by snow. Northern Europe is really poorly covered in Google Earth. :(

[Kullat Nunu]

Although it is hard to say exactly what places have been updated, there are clearly many more hi-res regions now available. For example, parts of the Sunda Strait have been updated (but still not Krakatoa, dammit!) and Mount Olga near Uluru in Australia. I've been in Zambia (in 2001, for obvious reasons...), and I regularly check it--there's lot more coverage in western region, unfortunately not in the places I've been.

Oh, I forgot to mention that a short while ago all Japan's buildings became available in 3D!

[mickal555]

nuh- still can't zoom into the last level where I live...

[Kullat Nunu]

Highest resolution areas are rather limited.

[BigDon]

I do find it faintly creepy that I can zoom in on where I live and can easily make out my brothers red Grand Cherokee in its parking spot. And in the next moment peer down into peoples backyards in the middle of Africa to see two overstuffed chairs facing a tv set.

[DaveC426913]

Yay! They updated Westend Toronto. I can now plot my house and property down to the foot!

W 43 36'04.23" N 79 29'59.93

[Blob]

The Google Earth Space Atlas was put together in honour of the Wirefly X PRIZE Cup. The concept is to have to have one location for a map of Google Earth placemarks for anything space-related on the Earth. We have pulled together collections from the Google Earth Community, and created a wealth of new material. Included are placemarks to space centres of many countries, launch sites, space museums, planetariums, moon trees, meteor impact craters, space shuttle landing sites, and more

Read more (http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2006/10/space_atlas_for_goog.html)

[Kullat Nunu]

New update! (http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2007/02/new_imagery_for_goog.html)



Entire country of Switzerland at 50cm and many Swiss cities at 25cm
Entire country of Switzerland terrain at 10m resolution, Swiss Alps are now high-res!
Entire country of Denmark at 50cm
Australia day flyover (Google maps special, 3 in/pixel resolution)
Cities of France: Lyon; Le Mans; Lourdes; Reims; Nancy; Limoges; Lille; Arles
Potsdam and Magdeburg, Germany
Barcelona, Belem, Cape Town, Galapagos (Isabella Island), Manaus, Mt Saint Helens, Recife, Rio, Venice
Whistler British Columbia
Full state coverage for Wyoming & Utah
Cities and counties in the US: Kirkland, WA; 6 counties in Arksansas; Dallas county, IA; Rutherford County, NC; Lancaster County, NE; Johnson County, NC; Lee County, NC;
significant amounts of new Digital Globe data



Terrain resolution really makes a difference. If you don't believe me, check Mount St. Helens, which has also high resolution terrain. Remember to set the terrain quality at maximum at the settings.

[Serenitude]

My hometown is still a white blur with a marker :lol:

[jamesabrown]

My house lot is in high-res. It has been since I first downloaded Google Earth years ago.

Thing is, the lot's still vacant. I had the house I live in built three and a half years ago, it took four months to construct, and the streets were paved a year before that. According to Google Earth, I currently live in a big open field, and a satellite hasn't passed over my property in nearly five years.

[Whirlpool]

Is there any way in Google Earth to tell the date a particular area was imaged on?


Ummm. I think there is .

I have encountered that where I looked for a place , and while tracking , theres the date when it has been shot.

I have to checked it again.


:think:

[Kullat Nunu]

It was not that long ago when Matterhorn was basically missing (the terrain resolution wasn't high enough to show the peak). Look now...

[Kullat Nunu]

Ummm. I think there is .

I have encountered that where I looked for a place , and while tracking , theres the date when it has been shot.

I have to checked it again.


:think:

You can find the dates for Digital Globe images by activating the Digital Globe Coverage layers. It is somewhat clumsy, but I don't know any better way.

[Kullat Nunu]

10% of Berlin (ca. 44,000 buildings) is now in 3D!

The models are not yet in Google Earth, but you can fetch the collection here (http://www.3d-stadtmodell-berlin.de/3d/en/C/seite1.jsp?nav1=open) (I got a 404 error when opened the file, though).

Hamburg was supposed to be the first 3D town in GE, but apparently Berlin got first.

[Kullat Nunu]

Google Earth Blog: New Imagery for Google Earth - June 2nd! (http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2007/06/new_imagery_for_goog_1.html)

* UK updated - Most of England is now in high resolution.
* Parts of Greenland
* Antarctica - some strips of high resolution down here
* Parts of Canada with new high resolution, big area around Toronto
* Catalonia part of Spain
* State of Alabama
* St. Paul, Minnesota
* Puerto Rico has more high resolution
* Iran has lots of new Digital Globe satellite strips
* New Zealand has some new coverage
* Parts of Russia

[Kullat Nunu]

Google Earth Blog: Google Releases High Resolution Terrain - Western US and Canaries (http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2007/06/google_releases_high.html)

This is major news. Google has today just posted new high resolution (10 meter) terrain for the western United States. This is very significant as it will make the area look even more realistic when viewed by Google Earth's 3D capabilities. For example, the satellite and aerial photography better matches the terrain, so the imagery and 3D both look much better! Trust me, I've started visiting mountains I've been to before and they look great!

I checked the Crater Lake in Oregon--you can see the small caldera on the summit of the Wizard Island. Too bad the high-resolution imagery doesn't yet cover the lake.

On La Palma--pan over the central island. High resolution imagery + terrain is just awesome.

[Pip]

I don't know if it was affected at all, but Mt. St. Helens looks worse than it did before. The image and the terrain are barely lined up at all.

[Pinemarten]

Google Earth seems to have experienced a huge downgrade since Friday. Major areas of formerly at least so-so resolution are now no resolution at all, at least for me. Take a look at Everett, WA to see what I mean.

Edit: Well, never mind. It was working for the guy next to me so I exited and came back in. Now it's fine, or at least as it was before. Why did it do that?

If you look at the bottom of the screen there is a 'percent loaded' progress indicator. Sometimes it hangs and I have to restart the program. Just a thought.

[suntrack2]

can I see my city thereon in the earth.google and how? :)

[Kullat Nunu]

Your home city is visible at least in low resolution which allows you to find the approximate location of your home if you know where it is. The default resolution is not good enough to discern individual buildings, however. On the other hand, if your city is located in an area that has high resolution available, you should be able to find your home easily.

Google Maps (http://maps.google.com) has the same imagery as Google Earth but it takes a while until it gets updated. To view Google Maps you require nothing but an Internet browser, but Google Earth is a standalone application that can be downloaded here (http://earth.google.com) for free. It should work even on a low-end computer but to view high-resolution terrain or buildings you need a fairly new machine.

[Glom]

Gatwick airport is still missing the new air bridge.

I see no-one's put offshore installations either.

[Lianachan]

Still practically no hi-res of the Scottish Highlands :(

At least they added some for Lewis, Harris and the Shetland Isles a while ago.

[Glom]

Still practically no hi-res of the Scottish Highlands :(

At least they added some for Lewis, Harris and the Shetland Isles a while ago.

Aberdeenshire is pretty sparse too. How am I supposed to spy on the yards of the Portlethen suppliers?

[Trebuchet]

As a Brother Cadfael fan, I glad to finally see some hi-res of Shrewsbury. Now they just need to get rid of that car park and reconstruct the Abbey grounds!

[Kullat Nunu]

New imagery update (http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2007/07/where-in-world-is.html). Instead of revealing the updated locations, Google gave a puzzle:



Two states known for their majestic peaks have gotten an upgrade.
I can now see where my favorite maple syrup is made.
Certain Florida beaches (and 1 mountain) are looking much improved.
Try counting the warthogs in the Boneyard.
Peek inside the home of the Brew Crew.
You can read the Skin's logo painted on their field.
An historic state capitol building is now in high res.
This city was named after the Native American name of a nearby mountain, "Tacobet."
A "far away" city that played a key role in trans-Saharan trade can now be seen close up.
The town where Jane Austen spent her final years is much clearer.
The topic of Vincent van Gogh's Cafe Terrace at Night is now bright as day.
Take a look at "la ville noir," where Cointreau was invented.
Only a third of this country's land is arable, but you can now view the entire country in high res.
From 1880 to 1884 this German city was home to the world's tallest building.
Rockets may be used to disrupt rain clouds over this city next summer.
This country received an impressive terrain update, you might call it Lord of the Terrain.

[sarongsong]

Correct answers (http://www.digitalearthblog.com/2007/07/26/image-and-terrain-update-for-google-earth/)?

[Trebuchet]

I was wondering if "Tacobet" was Tacoma. But I've lived in the Puget Sound region for 40 years, including quite a few in Tacoma, and I've never seen that spelling before.

The resolution in Tacoma, at least the part where my parents live, was already pretty good. Although I can't tell if that's their white car or ours under the tree.

[Kullat Nunu]

New imagery update (http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2007/07/where-in-world-is.html). Instead of revealing the updated locations, Google gave a puzzle:

Correct answers are here (http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2007/08/new_terrain_and_imag.html). Google Maps are now updated, too.

Updated Terrain:
Eastern US 10m, West Virginia 3m, Alaska 60m, New Zealand 10m

Oh sweet. I can only hope that my hometown is updated to the standard resolution in this century.

New Zealand is definitely worth checking. If you wondered why the whole south-western region of the South Island is a national park, you don't need anymore. The place is incredibly mountainous, and looks really good with the new high-resolution data.

[Kullat Nunu]

The newest Google Earth beta has a new feature that is very relevant to this forum: the sky (http://www.ogleearth.com/2007/08/google_earth_42.html)! You can for example zoom into the Horsehead Nebula!

[jt-3d]

Not that I'm bitter, though I am, but Tyre (http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=tyre&ie=UTF8&ll=33.269659,35.203843&spn=0.016649,0.028539&t=k&z=15&om=1) has been screwed by this update. The old version had an unobstructed view. The new one has clouds over the hippodrome.

http://www.jt-3d.com/pics2/tyre_1_old.jpg
http://www.jt-3d.com/pics2/tyre_1_new.jpg

However El Djem (http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=el+djem&sll=35.245619,11.217041&sspn=4.162724,7.305908&ie=UTF8&ll=35.296563,10.706434&spn=0.016252,0.028539&t=k&z=15&om=1) has gotten as great upgrade. Is it a fair trade? I guess it depends on what you're after and whether you got screen shots or not.;)

[Kullat Nunu]

There should be an option to see the older imagery when possible.

[Trebuchet]

Interesting effect off the ferry dock in Port Townsend, WA. This is a link to Google maps, but the same image is in GE.
link (http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=port+townsend,+wa&ie=UTF8&ll=48.11097,-122.758291&spn=0.001698,0.003648&t=k&z=18&iwloc=addr&om=1)

No, there's not a sunken ferry there! They just caught one at the blend of two images.

[Lianachan]

Anybody checked out the massive update (Google Sky)? Only came to my attention today, so sorry if it's old hat. I am EXTREMELY impressed.

(EDITED - Apparently, it's quite new hat (http://www.bautforum.com/1054836-post65.html) - didn't spot that post)

[Kullat Nunu]

Somebody has made a horizon addon (http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2007/08/sky_goodies_hubble_t.html) for Google Sky.

There is also a build-in flight simulator (http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2007/08/flight_simulator_mod.html) in Google Earth! You can fly with an F-16 fighter plane or an SR22 propeller airplane.

[Kullat Nunu]

Belated news -- new imagery update (http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2007/09/where-in-world-is.html)

Today we've published a significant amount of new or updated 60cm satellite imagery for Google Earth, with the Google Maps update to follow shortly. Much of this imagery is concentrated in the U.S., Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa, India, China, Australia and New Zealand. I encourage everyone to go exploring -- you never know what you might find.

The imagery we're publishing today touches approximately 130 different countries, so there's plenty out there to discover!

And, of course, my country is not among them. Northern Europe is becoming (already is?) the most neglected region on the Google Earth, imagery-wise (not counting places like Antarctica).

I addition, geotagged YouTube videos can be viewed on Google Earth (http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/GoogleEarthBlog/~3/168420111/new_youtube_layer_in_google_earth.html) (in Windows only).