Google Maps, Earth take on full 3D imagery | Hacker News Reader

Google Maps, Earth take on full 3D imagery

engadget.com

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Sorry for the lack of content. I hoped they would have updated it properly.

antr submitted[0] a better link[1] with video. Seekable press event[2] is also up with more information.

[0] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4074972

[1] http://thenextweb.com/google/2012/06/06/google-maps-launches...

[2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMBJ2Hu0NLw#t=4105s

Yours has been updated with the same video.

For a demo of what this will look like, try Nokia's WebGL-based mapping demo: http://maps3d.svc.nokia.com/webgl/index.html

They only have 3D imagery in a few cities so far (click on the city markers).

3D is awesome, but the better feature is offline maps. Now I can make my older android a dedicated offline GPS unit.

FWIW, that is currently a Google Labs feature on Android devices and has been available for some time. Perhaps they offer downloading of additional layers, but that wasn't demonstrated.

Is navigation available offline, though? They didn't mention it.

From the CNet live blog I saw, they said GPS will work offline. That doesn't confirm that navigation will work, but at least there's that.

GPS already works offline, doesn't it? It just places you on a grid with no tiles.

Looks great. A few points:

- They used new imagery from planes to do this, not the existing streetview imagery - I guess that means optical matching of the kind needed to do this (make a model from streetview imagery) is still a ways off.

- 3d maps has been done like this already (by bing and others), though this looks a better resolution.

- As someone who works with city spaces - can I use the 3d data? How can I download it or who do I have to pay?

>- As someone who works with city spaces - can I use the 3d data? How can I download it or who do I have to pay?

I don't work with city spaces and I would still kill to have access to the 3d data.

if it's getting to your client via HTTP there will be a way to get at it, legit or not.

> - 3d maps has been done like this already (by bing and others), though this looks a better resolution.

Bing appears to be using a non-scalable approach for Bird's Eye view. E.g., Seattle downtown contains a few 3d buildings in a very confined area. It might even be manually modeled.

What Google has announced is impressive because it is automated and scalable. Small demos are great and all (e.g. C3) but qualitatively different from getting something like this deployed into the real world.

Disclaimer: I work at Google.

C3 is a "small demo"? C3's 3D maps have been deployed and are publicly usable and cover at least 25 metropolitan areas. Google may be catching up fast, but there is nothing shown in the video that C3 haven't done already.

Plus, let's not forget that Apple bought C3, so I wouldn't be surprised to see them roll this out at an even larger scale next week.

Sorry, I was not aware that C3 had been at that stage. Kudos for C3.

Sorry. Clearly I remembered that wrong. I was thinking of yell.co.uk in the uk. Not sure why I wrote bing.

This looks incredible but I'm a little put off by this only being available for mobile. Did I actually read that right? I would expect this to also come to the desktop browser but it doesn't sound like that's happening...

Or is this simply the same functionality already available on desktop browsers being brought to mobile? I got the impression it was a new level of detail.

I'm not sure if this feature can realistically be brought to desktop at this point.

We're talking about a whole lot of 3D rendering, many polygons, and a whole crapload of textures. Easy pickings for a smartphone native app, where just about every major phone on the market has obscene amounts of hardware acceleration under the hood.

Not so easy for desktops - whose graphical performance is often nearly non-existent. Not to mention you take another huge performance hit from WebGL... which also has poor penetration. So not only would most users be unable to use your newfangled 3D maps, many of the ones that can, will have an unusably slow experience.

This is one of those places where native apps really shine.

Hopefully they can at least get it on Google Earth soon.

Parent should be captured for posterity:

2000 - "Run this on a phone? You're crazy" 2012 - "Run this on a desktop? Insane!"

Most desktops, even those with crappy Intel GPUs have superior GPU performance to the best mobile devices. WebGL has poor penetration, but you really don't take much performance hit as long as you don't need to process data in JS, but then again, a modern i5 or i7 is much faster than an ARM on a mobile device, so what you loose in JS performance, you gain in CPU performance.

Current JS and WebGL performance is well within the range needed to make this work. MapsGL is already rendering a quite large workload, in fact, my intuition is that the 2D rendering, especially with rasterizing label text all over the place, is likely more expensive than navigating an octree and rendering a mesh.

Desktops have inferior 3d rendering capabilities compared to smart phones? Since when? Any desktop bought in the last 5 years will have an integrated or dedicated graphics chip that can at least match smartphone capabilities in this area. This can be demonstrated easily by using your desktop to browse Nokia's 3d map demo, which is equivalent to what Google is doing here. Whether WebGL is fast enough to do this on it's own is open to debate, but there isn't anything to indicate these 3d maps are particularly demanding for desktops.

I'm guessing the "new process" is structure from motion and high-performance bundle adjustment (probably using Ceres, which they just opened). It's fascinating to think what they'll be able to reconstruct with their computing power and hi-res satellite imagery and millions of Picasa photos.

Google Maps/Earth is a simply amazing product. I've seen a lot of hype building about what Apple is to unveil in the coming days, but I honestly cannot imagine what they can present that can challenge Google (though it won't be hard for them to challenge the terrible mapping in iOS currently which, while using basic Google tiles, is in an app built by Apple). You mentioned Picasa and that reminded me that a few weeks ago I was showing my children some sights (e.g. the Eiffel tower) from around the world, and all over the place were overlaid, perfectly mapped personal photos.

In the demonstration they discussed how they do this, which is essentially Google Planes getting AirView with special cameras (very similar to Google StreetView).

Well based on what I've seen from Google so far it looks like what C3 (whom Apple acquired) has had for a while now. So to be honest it is Google catching up in the 3D space.

And clearly Google is rattled as all of this comes just days before Apple is set to announce their products. I guess losing a significant amount of traffic (all iOS users) will do that to you.

Either way it will be nice for Google to have some honest competition.

Does iOS maps show ads from Google?

None. There is profoundly little value for Google in having Google serve the mapping for iOS, unless Apple is paying the big dollars (I suppose possible given that Google has started monetizing mapping), though we know in the net exchange Google pays far more to sit as the default search for iOS Safari, having nothing to do with mapping.

I've seen the "mobile wars" bit about Apple dumping Google across the news world and it's a bit bizarre really as no one can state what Google gains from the current situation, but I guess just the glory of being iOS' mapping technology?

This is incorrect. There are sponsored links at times inserted via Google Maps API.

I don't believe this is correct. I can't think of any instances that sponsored links have been inserted into my maps, and the terms of service still say that they reserve the right to insert ads in the future (with a 90 day warning), but that they don't do so right now.

Yup. I was searching for a hotel in Roswell, and a "sponsored link" located the Motel6 with a different pin icon than the others.

Go center the map on Roswell, NM. Search for "motel" and you'll see the ad, and it will come back as the default selected pin.

Exactly. Search results for businesses or locations in Gmaps on iOS are broken because of all the irrelevant junk they include, and I can only assume they do it because they got paid.

C3 has had essentially tech demos, just as Microsoft Research has. For that matter what Google has shown thus far is nothing more than a demo. It's really up to who can scale it up in a fully usable mapping technology, and I have a lot of faith in Google on that front.

3D imaging alone is close to useless. Google already has superb mapping, navigation, traffic and information systems, and layer that atop just ensures that they miss no checklist items. It's going to be incredibly difficult for Apple to compete with Google's offering, especially given that the gimmick (which it really is) of 3D has been diffused.

I guess losing a significant amount of traffic (all iOS users) will do that to you.

I honestly don't get this line of thought. The rather terrible iOS mapping application has zero Google ads or integration with other Google services. Where is Google profiting from that situation?

While everyone is busy firing up the conspiracy that Apple is dumping Google, it seems far more logical that the dumping is going the other way, and has been underway for years (the Android mapping app is literally years ahead of the iOS mapping proggy).

Where they benefit is brand recognition. It has ensured, at least up until now, that everyone and their grandma – with an iPhone – thinks 'google' when they think 'maps'.

I honestly don't get this line of thought. The rather terrible iOS mapping application has zero Google ads or integration with other Google services. Where is Google profiting from that situation?

Actually, the iOS Maps app does offer sponsored links. e.g. http://www.flickr.com/photos/mjaysplanet/6992735051/

I often see sponsored links when mapping stuff in the Bay Area; no clue how common they are elsewhere. (Though the above link is a screenshot of Maps in the Netherlands.)

Presumably Google, not Apple, is profiting from those sponsored links, but I've never seen confirmation either way. If it is Google, then they might see some fiscal impact when Apple stops driving iOS traffic their way.

(And I think it's far, far more likely that Apple's dumping Google. Apple's made key acquisitions for satellite imagery, spacial rendering, and mapping; Google already had that tech in-house. Why would Apple make such a large fiscal investment if they had no plans to ditch Google? Likewise, if they knew they'd move all their mapping tech in-house, why let Google make advancements on iOS? By keeping the Google-based Maps app simple, it's easier to wow customers when they deploy their own solution. If Google were allowed to innovate, then Apple would be forced to be on par, and likely would try to be better, when the Apple-based Maps app went live.)

> Presumably Google, not Apple, is profiting from those sponsored links, but I've never seen confirmation either way

I don't think that's correct. Apple makes the application, not Google. It's possible, but it seems unlikely that there's a clause in their contract that says, "we'll give you map tiles, you also have to show these sponsored links."

It would be great if Google brought a Maps app to iOS, if only for the competition.

A quick bit of Googling turned up the following confirmation that those ads are, in fact, sold by Google: http://thenextweb.com/apple/2012/01/06/hate-the-ads-in-the-i...

I fully expect Google will ship their own mapping app for iOS, if they're ousted from Maps. Also, it's not like there isn't already competition – searching for "maps" on the App Store reveals a healthy collection of mapping apps, including MapQuest and Garmin.

It seems far fetched now, but I actually expect streetview UAVs sooner than most people likely think.

This seems incredibly plausible, especially since the pieces are already there (you could probably hack one together in a weekend for $1,000).

The biggest hurdle I foresee is in legislation - how is Joe the Plumber going to feel about a private company flying UAVs over his backyard taking pictures?

Am I the only one who expected the waves to be moving in that last scene in the video showing the Cliff House and Seal Rock in SF?

This. Since February 2009, when Google released Google Earth 5.0, adding the animated waves [1], I've being thinking that eventually, they could actually make a nicer animated coastline, like in so many games now. But comparing the satellite view, with the map view, maybe the resolution is not currently good enough to make the simulated water overlap perfectly the pictures and make the coast look nice.

[1] http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2009/02/post_3.html

Looks awesome. I look forward to playing around with it in Google Earth.

What I seriously want? GTA: Google Maps. Even if you can't walk into the buildings or anything. Even if it's top-down only.

I want it. Want want want want.

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