geo2web.com

Ritee Rouf, Product Marketing Manager

When we received an invitation to attend a friend’s wedding in Hawaii, my husband and I couldn’t think of a better way to spend our summer vacation. I started my research and quickly realized what a hassle it can be to make travel plans. When you’re traveling with kids, spontaneity is not really on the top of your list; you want to plan as much as possible ahead of time. So I started searching on Google Maps, found a hotel close to the beach, and even had the chance to scope out some family-friendly restaurants. I also discovered some interesting travel My Maps that others had created to share stories, photos, and videos from their own trips.

To make travel planning easier for everyone, we have put together some simple travel tips for you at http://maps.google.com/tripplanning including a “how to” video tutorial.

And if you’re still trying to find that perfect vacation spot, you can explore photos, videos, and popular searches about a particular place on Google Maps, or turn on the Panoramio photo layer to see what destination catches your eye. Bon voyage!

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As in real life, navigating in Google Earth is easier if you have some physical reference points. Some of these are obvious and popular, such as the road, borders and labels layers. In addition, you can orient yourself by using Places of Interest layers. Within this folder, I find the following very useful:

Geographic Features - I spend a lot of time hiking and biking and this folder shows great information (bodies of water, mountain peaks, etc.) in areas that have fewer roads. Plus, you can check out historic seismic activity around the world, courtesy of the USGS.

Parks and Recreation Areas - Again, my bias towards the great outdoors is in effect here. But this information is fantastic. Camping spots, trail routes, wildlife refuges, ranger stations and more. The USFS boundaries can help you work with traditional topographical maps to find your way.

Of course, you may need to zoom in a bit to see some of these points of interest in the 3D viewer.

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Henrik Stewenius, Software Engineer, Google Zurich

Have you ever looked at a photo and wondered what was beyond its edges - just what was left of that castle or what the facade of Notre Dame looks like from close up? We certainly have, which is why I’m happy to tell you about a new feature we’ve just introduced for Panoramio, Google’s site for sharing geo-tagged photos.

Panoramio enables photographers to geo-locate, store and organize their photographs and to view those images in their geographic context. You may already have seen photos from the Panoramio layer while zooming around in Google Earth or Google Maps (just click the “more” button), but have you visited the Panoramio website? Now, when browsing photos on the site you can explore multiple images of a particular location in a more seamless way.

For select photos on www.panoramio.com, you’ll find a new link below the photo:

When you click it, a pop-up will appear that looks like this:

When you mouse over an image, you’ll see polygonal frames appear. Each of these frames represents a photo of the same location taken from a different angle or perspective. Just click on the frame to view that photo, and continue exploring. You can also click the thumbnails on the right-hand panel.

Follow the “Look around” link from this photo of Notre Dame in Paris or St Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow to see them from all different angles. Take a look at these beautiful photos of the Astrological Clock in Prague.

We’re experimenting with this new feature, so you won’t find the “look around” link for all of the over 5 million photos shared in Panoramio. For now you’ll find it primarily on photos of popular tourist attractions, but, as with our other tools and services, we plan to keep tinkering with it, so keep an eye out for new developments.

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I am currently sitting in the Plaine de Plainpalais in Geneva, Switzerland. Huge television screens and a large number of beer tents have been erected in the square for the start of the 2008 European Football Championship.

The tournament, which is being hosted by Austria and Switzerland kicks-off this Saturday but there is already a huge amount of excitement and anticipation about the competition. On Sunday, as I drove around Lake Geneva (Lac L?man), all the bridges were covered with flag-waving Portuguese fans who had heard that the team would be driving past from the airport.

Google have of course produced a Google Map for the occasion. The Google Fan Map shows all the stadiums being used in the competition, the tournament schedule and details about each of the teams.

It is also possible to turn on a Panoramio layer to view photos, and a Bars / Clubs layer which tags thousands of bars throughout Europe. The side-panel of the map includes a news section which I presume is presenting an RSS feed of the tournament from Google News.

The map is available in all of these countries, UK, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Netherlands, Czech Republic, Russia, Poland, Austria, Switzerland and Sweden.

As well as the Fan Map Google is celebrating Euro ‘08 with dedicated YouTube channels where you can upload and share videos.

Via: Google LatLong: European Football Championship 2008 - Google Fan Map!

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