Next gen mapping visualization | Hacker News Reader

Next gen mapping visualization

c3technologies.com

35 pointsjuliang9 comments

I'm sold, good find. I wonder waht the costs and hosting requirements are like? You'd think this would be a no-brainer for both municipalities and chambers of commerce. The imagery is great for consumers but I can see the 3d models being useful for everything from traffic simulations to real estate development. It's like Google Earth on crack.

http://www.c3technologies.com/en_demo.php for demos (plugin must be installed) The 3d is a little ropey when you zoom all the way in and set the view angle very flat. Things like cars and trees sort of rise out of the ground as if they were hills...and that sounds much worse than it is. I'm amazed. Now if you used these 3d heightmaps as correlation data for some 3d analysis of streetview images we'd be in James Bond territory.

Also http://www.c3technologies.com/en_documentation.php?id=1

It looks great, but unfortunately, the plugin is Windows only (and I'd never install a random plugin anyway), and the Java-based demo won't work either since I just turned Java off (http://landonf.bikemonkey.org/code/macosx/CVE-2008-5353.2009...)

It works in Safari 4 with Java off.

Are you confusing the video with the live, interactive demo? You need Windows or Java for the latter, as far as I can tell.

Indeed I am! I didn't realize there was an interactive demo. Thanks for clarifying.

I learned a little about the Stereoptics (doubt that's a word) that are used for this type of model construction in my AI degree. What I found pretty awe inspiring, and awash with potential, was the project Flikr are engaged in. They compute 3d models of popular landmarks and sight-seeing destinations using the varied photos from all angles that are uploaded to their servers. I always figured that this, along with something akin to what this Swedish company (or if anyone saw the Chinese one that was on HN a while back, complete with billboards!?) would be the next generation development platform for games and who knows what!

You mean stereopsis?

yes, in essence but I'm not sure the word suffices? From what I can infer, that is a noun, and that wouldn't follow as the correct usage.

"I learned a little about the Stereopsis that are used for this type of model construction in my AI degree."

That, to my mind, doesn't make sense. Whereas the "stereoptics" involved in the _process_ of "stereopsis" seems to fit my Universal Grammar Function (with equal measures of disdain and honour for Chomsky).

Dunno, I'm an anally retentive grammar nazi, this can be easily evidenced by my overt use of the "quotation" "marks" around "my" words..... it's a serious mental condition, people!

EDIT: Wikipedia doesn't seem to agree with me, though

This is amazing. State of the art from what I can see.

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