i think i speak for all here when i say sveeeeet!
On 6/30/05, William Beaty <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > If you thought the satellite photos on maps.google.com were cool, try > downloading the earth viewer from http://earth.google.com (10megs, so far > it's winXP only, and needs a fast link for streaming data.) > > It's somewhat like the satellite map viewer, but you can tilt the plane > and view the surfaces mapped onto 3D terrain data (like a flight > simulator.) The viewer has an earth globe, and you can move the "camera" > most anywhere. The resolution of the Seattle images are much higher than > Terraserver (someone said they're aerial photographs rather than satellite > scans.) > > You can descend to ground level, turn horizontal, and try to drive around > your neighborhood, or around distant > neighborhoods. Turn on the street names, the zip code boundaries, the > schools and hospitals, the restaurants, the country borders, the volcano > names, the "info spot" links to web forums, etc., etc. Go down inside the > grand canyon and wait for the surface details to download. Go up a few > hundred miles, give the earth a spin, and you whiz along with Shuttle > trajectory and speed while panning the camera viewpoint around. Set some > "thumbtacks" at various spots on the USA, and when you double-click the > names, you fly on smooth suborbital trajectory (and the blue sky even > turns black appropriately whenever you're high enough.) Zoom way out and > make the planet rotate end-over-end with the country of your choice at the > North pole. Hmmm, I wonder if the stars in the background are correct? > > There's also a $20 version and a $400 version that lets you draw 3D > buildings or record WMV movies of your travels. > > > (((((((((((((((((( ( ( ( ( (O) ) ) ) ) ))))))))))))))))))) > William J. Beaty SCIENCE HOBBYIST website > billb at amasci com http://amasci.com > EE/programmer/sci-exhibits amateur science, hobby projects, sci fair > Seattle, WA 206-789-0775 unusual phenomena, tesla coils, weird sci > > -- "Monsieur l'abbé, I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to write" Voltaire
