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Google Maps Adds Drone Imagery
joshuadugie writes "Slashdot carried a story a while ago that Google had purchased drones for unknown purposes. Google Maps has now added new non-satellite imagery (at UT Austin, for example) when you zoom in close enough. Mystery solved!" I'd like to think that there really are (or were) drones over Austin, but would also like to see Google's explanation for the close-up images.
yet you state that in your headline anyway?
Brilliant.
http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2009/12/changing-your-perspective.html Just starting to be available in more places it looks like.
You overestimate people. I suspect the main purpose will be to look for couples having sex in their backyard. Hmm... be back later.
Actually, yes, sort of... the majority of the higher res images on Google Maps, is taken from light aircraft fitted with specialized camera equipment.
The imagery is taken most for surveying, council and real-estate uses, not for applications like Google Maps.
I would bet the Austin imagery is also done this way.
As an example, http://nearmap.com/ offers quite high res imagery.
Its mentioned here they the photos are taken with low flying aircraft: http://www.nearmap.com/products/photomap-coverage
It seems that this is a joint effort with Sanborn given the copyright notice on the bottom of the image. Sanborn uses LiDAR as one of it's tools.
I'd also like to note that Bing has had areas covered with a similar angular mapping for a while. Their images are tagged with the name Pictometry.
So, yes, it seems it is a "guy taking pictures out of a Cessna". Or something close to it.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
Look, everyone knows that the Google index server has evolved sentience and is currently hunting for Sarah Connor. You might as well just admit that's what the drones were really for.
Drones are illegal in the US without a Certificate to Operate from the FAA. The FAA does not provide CtO's lightly, nor have they ever granted one for operation over a populated area...and before anyone links to DIY Drones, this rule is for corporations, not individuals who operate under r/c rules (under 400 ft AGL, within sight without any vision enhancement devices such as binoculars).
Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.
My brother used to work as a commercial real estate appraiser. He talked to one of the first guys in Texas (perhaps the US) who retrofitted his Cessna with a viewport, a fancy DSLR, and a laptop. He flew around Houston and other cities in TX once a year or on demand, and took high res images that his software stitched together later. It may not be economical compared to a drone, but it was affordable, especially compared to satellite imagery at the time.
Were Google's drones just RC craft piloted by a certified pilot on the ground? I thought automated aircraft (no pilot) and RC craft flown by non-pilots were not allowed in controlled airspace in the USA.
Google Maps, AFAIK, has _always_ included non-satellite imagery. Higher resolution images have _always_ been from aerial photographs taken by aircraft. From the Google Blog, a few days ago:
...The folks who created Google Earth devised a way to stitch aerial and satellite imagery together into a seamless, searchable map of the world and make it available to anyone with a computer...
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/10/world-as-eagle-and-wild-goose-see-it.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+blogspot/MKuf+(Official+Google+Blog)&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher
I kid you not, I can see the RG6 on the roof of the building across the street! (San Diego)
I took a look at my own building first to see if there were new, higher-resolution images. Sure enough, I could see the plastic conduit on our roof that carries the Cox cables to each stack. I think it's about a 4" conduit.
Just for yucks, I pan over to the building across the street, and I can see the bare RG6 laid on the roof.
Voila! I now have the photographs to accompany my presentation to the HOA about how stupid it is that our cable is laid-out orthogonally, as opposed to the sensible, star layout across the street. (It's so stupidly laid-out that it accounts for the 8db difference between my living-room drop and bedroom drop.)
See link below. (What the heck, privacy is dead, right?) This isn't even at maximum zoom, you can zoom in further yourself. I left it at this zoom level so you can see both buildings at the same time.
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=2414+Front+Street,+San+Diego,+CA&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=36.726391,79.013672&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=2414+Front+St,+San+Diego,+California+92101&ll=32.730802,-117.165676&spn=0.000842,0.001206&t=h&z=20
Perhaps.
But then, until quite recently, I thought that driverless cars were not allowed, either.
YMMV.
Kid-proof tablet..
I thought automated aircraft (no pilot) and RC craft flown by non-pilots were not allowed in controlled airspace in the USA.
Not all US airspace is controlled - in fact, the vast majority is not, particularly at the low altitudes you'd need to be flying at to get this kind of imagery.
Ummm.... if it's "non-satellite imagery," where else could it be from?
I'd think a guy taking pictures out of a Cessna wouldn't be very economical long-term compared to a drone.
Lots of imagery on Google Earth and Google Maps is non-satellite imagery when you zoom in close. Look at Downtown Seattle some time. You can see the sides of buildings.
Google gets images from a lot of places. In the case of Seattle and NYC the images were taken by aircraft under contract to the city for their own use, and purchased by Google. The resolution is almost as good as the UT Austin images. You can see some weird leaning buildings in Google Earth.
These images were there long before Google even announced the purchase of these drones.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
You can probably get a plane and a pilot for less than 100 an hour.
Eh? Even if you dig for the lowest of the low, novice pilots you are paying the pilot $25 an hour, more unless they are your employee, which doesn't include things like plane, fuel, or insurance. Current typical airplane fuel costs are $5 [minimum] per gallon.
If flying even the lightest turboprop imaginable, this still will consumes approximately 7 gallons of fuel per hour, probably more by the time they've gotten all their various computer equipment and cameras on board for mapping.
All said and done, a minimum $50 for fuel + $25 pilot = $75.
Unless the plane is a 30 year old death trap, it's unlikely its owner will rent it to you for a mere $25 an hour.
It might be cheaper to just buy/license the media from some other company who already got that particular footage, or buy the assets from the company when they're having a fire sale / liquidation.
I see "Texas Orthoimagery Program" which lead me to this
http://www.tnris.state.tx.us/News/InFocus_tpl.aspx?id=1756
colinnwn told you about fixed-wing drones...but a lot of aerial photography is now done with helicopter drones (less safe than a manned heli, they don't auto-rotate as long because they're smaller and have 2-stroke piston engines instead of turbines, but are much cheaper to run than a fixed-wing drone, and of course they can hover) or quadcopters (again less safe, can't auto-rotate at all) or hexacopters (can fly or control their descent with up to 3 dead engines, usually have loads of spare lifting power and are incredibly agile when unladen, but again if they lose all power they drop like a rock).
Helicopter drones that can do decent aerial photography start at about 4ft. long (and maybe 4ft rotor diameter), a quadcopter or hexacopter would start at about 2ft. in body diameter.
There are also a few people using zeppelin/blimp drones now which are quite safe, if one lost all its lifting gas and fell on your head you'd just get a bruise if any hard parts hit you, they fall pretty slow because they have the mass-to-surface area ratio of a Chinese take-out box. The only danger with these airships is they can get blown into power lines. The ones that can do aerial photography start at about 20ft. long.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Far, far easier is to work with the National Guard to use the no-fly zone over Ft. Bragg or some other similar federal installations.
Compare this with the fact that you can rent a small plane, a pilot, and a camera for less than $200/hr *right this minute* and you'll see why no one even bothers with UAVs, except as research projects.
You can only operate under the model aircraft rules if you aren't being paid, and no, you can't just claim you're taking a vacation day. The university would have to testify that you stole the UAV if anything happened.