Google Street View: was this one of Google's vehicles?
Yesterday, I posted a photo of one of the vehicles used by Immersive Media, a contractor that provided some of the imaging services for Google's new "Street View" thing. But Immersive Media apparently did not do all of the imaging, and I'm told that Google did some themselves (or perhaps with other contractors). BB reader Ben says,
I snapped this picture back in March. It shows 4 Nikon DLSRs with wide angle lenses mounted to the top of a car. Google Street View vehicle, or... something else? Link.Here's the intersection in Google Street View.
Previous BB posts on Google Street View:
Reader comment: Chris Genetti says,
I'd like to comment that it would be a thing of beauty if Google's Street-view team decided to map out Pittsuburgh in early July...Jon says,...July 5-8 (and presumably the fourth and ninth), 2007 is the slated date for Anthrocon, the world's largest furry convention. If Google Maps started showing up with a bunch of fursuiters (not quite underwear perverts but close.. sort of) and pointy-eared and fluffy-tailed furry fans wandering the streets, I think I would buy Google a cake and thank them for being awesome.
'Course, there's always the Midwest Furfest near Chicago held in November, and various other cons in Cali, Atlanta, etc. ;)
I noticed that unlike in other areas on Google Street View, you cannot look up or down in that intersection. It would make sense given the camera setup seen in that picture. However, the traffic in your picture looks a lot heavier that what is visible in streetview, but I wouldn't be suprised if they made multiple runs to get better pictures of areas that came out bad.Brian Aker says,
More possible Google Van Shots? While out for lunch yesterday I spotted one of these possible google vans parked in a drive way. So I took a bunch of photos :) One question that has come up, is what is the box labeled "SICK"? The other two boxes are pretty easily identified as cameras or a GPS unit. Link.Streetviewr says,
Follow up to your story this morning on the vehicle Google is using to take shots for Street View - this passed me on the way in to work this morning: JPEG 1, JPEG 2. I think it's the one since it looks like a similar vehicle to the one someone spotted here. Be interesting to see if images from their side ever appear on the site.Joshua McFarren says,
Regarding the Google van "Sick" box, Pretty sure thats a laser range-finder. Saw these on a NOVA episode. Almost all the vehicles entered in the DARPA Grand Challenge had multiples of these boxes.
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This method employed here creates ugly panoramas compared to the other, lighter cameras, used for most of Streetview imagery.
The more compact the camera system is, the smoother the transition will be!
was the car painted black and lacking license plates?
I noticed while looking at street view in New york city you could actually rotate the image down and get a look at the vehicle taking the photos, also in building reflections. It seems there they use some sort of fish eye lens set up.