6 replies to this topic

[SteveR]

http://maps.nokia.com/3D/
From the Finnish cell phone company Nokia, the above link will let you access a Google Earth-like world that has extreme 3D modeling of about two dozen cities around the world, including the suburbs, and even the trees, towers, bridges, and billboards. It also gives detailed street views in which you can often recognize the people and read the license plates.

I made an anaglyph from two slightly offset views so you can see how detailed the model is. This is a view of Mt. Sutro in San Francisco, looking south. If you have red/cyan 3D glasses, view it with the red lens over your left eye.

Steve Richardson
2i3D Stereo Imaging

 SutroANA.JPG   170.37K   51 downloads

[Thad]

Cool. Looks like Lidar for the topography/buildings/vegetation and some ortho-photography for the imagery.

[Matthew Hampton]

Nokia's OviMaps was produced by C3 Technologies whose groundbreaking methodologies and tech was recently purchased by Apple, Inc. (see previous post.)

This isn't LiDAR and ortho at all - it's just ortho and a bit of techno-magic. Most likely using a similar technique found here.

Steve's anaglyph is a very cool way of turning a digital 3D model into 2D representation. Well done.

[SteveR]

Thanks for the kind words, Matthew. As far as the Nokia 3D world goes, I think there's too much detail for these cities to simply be draped orthophotos, so it must be some kind of 3D model made by combining vertical and oblique aerial photographs.

Autodesk Research recently released some freeware software that does this kind of thing: Autodesk
123D Catch, previously called PhotoFly. To model a single building it probably needs at least 20 pictures from multiple viewpoints. I haven't tried it yet because I can't decide what I'd like to make a 3D model of, but it looks pretty easy to use: http://www.123dapp.com/catch

Steve Richardson
2i3D Stereo Imaging

[Matthew Hampton]

I think you are absolutely correct. I am sure they integrate oblique photo's.

This is from Technology Review:
"C3's models are generated with little human intervention. First, a plane equipped with a custom-designed package of professional-grade digital single-lens reflex cameras takes aerial photos. Four cameras look out along the main compass points, at oblique angles to the ground, to image buildings from the side as well as above. Additional cameras (the exact number is secret) capture overlapping images from their own carefully determined angles, producing a final set that contains all the information needed for a full 3-D rendering of a city's buildings. Machine-vision software developed by C3 compares pairs of overlapping images to gauge depth, just as our brains use stereo vision, to produce a richly detailed 3-D model.
"Unlike Google or Bing, all of our maps are 360° explorable," says Smith, "and everything, every building, every tree, every landmark, from the city center to the suburbs, is captured in 3-D—not just a few select buildings."

Here's a nice stream of the tech that is coming to Apple's ecosystem soon.

[victorwilson]

The application has just become available for the Nokia N9 on Nokia’s Beta Labs and has been available for Symbian devices for a sort while now.

[Matthew Hampton]

I wonder how much of this planet they have coverage for? It looks like they have coverage for these cities.

 Screen_shot_2012_01_13_at_8.27.jpg   183.91K   10 downloads