Google's new 3D Maps destroy Manhattan in the wake of Apple's Flyover
Nearly a year after Apple introduced its own Maps service in iOS 6 with Flyover 3D satellite views, Google is expanding its own online Maps to support similar 3D satellite imagery, with the same sorts of buckled roads and visual distortions Apple was castigated for last summer.
Google Maps 3D still a work in progress
That limits Google Maps' photorealistic 3D features to users of Chrome or Firefox on a Mac or Windows PC. Mobile users will have to settle for grey 3D building models or use the increasingly outdated Google Earth, which unlike Apple Maps' Flyover feature, is not integrated with the search and directions of Google's mobile Maps apps.
This makes the new Google Maps more akin to Nokia's web-based Maps 3D. Nokia's product, which while leveraging the same technology Apple acquired to build iOS Maps' Flyover features, is also limited to the desktop web browser. A year after Apple launched iOS 6 with Flyover, neither Google nor Nokia have a similar, integrated 3D visualization feature for their own mobile platforms.
Were Google to launch a 3D Maps app for Android with similar specifications to its current desktop maps product, it would only work on about 29 percent of the platform's reported installed base of devices, just like the company's Google Now, which requires Jelly Bean 4.1.
Access to the new Google Maps also requires an invitation, which links your online session to your Google account, reinforcing the company's ad-centric business model. The company's introduction to the new generation of Google Maps first highlights search features, then notes how the new product focuses on promoting businesses, "like restaurants that are recommended by your Google+ friends," as shown in the graphic below.
Source: Google
The last feature Google highlights is "amazing imagery for exploring the world," of which the company observes, "of course, no map would be complete without amazing images for exploring the world." Oddly enough, Google is pointing out that its own latest mobile maps for Android and iOS are not as "complete" as Apple's own iOS 6 Maps.
"The new carousel gathers all Google Maps imagery in one spot enabling you to fly through cities," it notes, carefully avoiding the "Flyover" term Apple introduced a year ago. And again, only on the desktop, and currently only in an invite-only beta, can Google Maps users "find the Earth view which directly integrates the beautiful 3D experience from Google Earth into the new maps."
Source: Google
AppleInsider reader Vesko Kateliev shared Google Map's above image of Midtown Manhattan (detailed at the native resolution, below), where roads turn into waterfalls and parked cars slide up the side of of a building as if trying to escape from a rolling wave of energy twisting buildings and bulging roads into the air.
Google Maps 3D still a work in progress
Apple's Flyover representation of the same area (below) is detailed enough to see that the building Google portrays as being smeared with taxis is actually a JC Penney, and you can even make out that the adjacent billboard is an iPad commercial. Apple even does a much better job at labels for points of interest and streets. Apple also labels 6th Avenue by its official name, "Avenue of the Americas," although a search of "6th Ave" also works.
Spin around Herald Square from the opposite direction and Google Map's 3D turns its trees into a strange pillar of goo (below top), a visualization that is clearly bested by Apple's detailed Flyover view in iOS 6 Maps (below bottom).
Google Maps 3D still a work in progress
While Google does a better job with major landmarks like the Empire State Building (below top), Apple's Flyover version is both much more detailed (an impressive feat given the processing power of the iPad compared to a desktop PC) and offers a clearer representation of its surroundings (visible in the two images below it).
Google Maps 3D still a work in progress
Apple has been focused on enhancing its own product, meeting the needs of developers and hiring new staff to work on the project.
Additional advancement of Maps for iOS 7, and perhaps on the Mac in OS X 10.9, is expected to be announced next month at the company's Worldwide Developer Conference.
Google has apparently felt the pinch of losing its default position as the Maps app iOS users see on their Home screen, as just last month the company's chair and former Apple board member Eric Schmidt said, "we would still really like them to use our maps" as the default choice in iOS.
"It would be easy for them to take the app in the store and put it as their basic one," he observed.
Google Maps 3D still a work in progress
Introducing the new Google Maps with 3D
Unlike Apple's iOS 6 Maps, which target relatively low powered mobile devices, the new 3D features in Google Maps that were introduced last week require a modern PC running a web browser with a supported version of WebGL hardware accelerated rendering.That limits Google Maps' photorealistic 3D features to users of Chrome or Firefox on a Mac or Windows PC. Mobile users will have to settle for grey 3D building models or use the increasingly outdated Google Earth, which unlike Apple Maps' Flyover feature, is not integrated with the search and directions of Google's mobile Maps apps.
This makes the new Google Maps more akin to Nokia's web-based Maps 3D. Nokia's product, which while leveraging the same technology Apple acquired to build iOS Maps' Flyover features, is also limited to the desktop web browser. A year after Apple launched iOS 6 with Flyover, neither Google nor Nokia have a similar, integrated 3D visualization feature for their own mobile platforms.
Were Google to launch a 3D Maps app for Android with similar specifications to its current desktop maps product, it would only work on about 29 percent of the platform's reported installed base of devices, just like the company's Google Now, which requires Jelly Bean 4.1.
Access to the new Google Maps also requires an invitation, which links your online session to your Google account, reinforcing the company's ad-centric business model. The company's introduction to the new generation of Google Maps first highlights search features, then notes how the new product focuses on promoting businesses, "like restaurants that are recommended by your Google+ friends," as shown in the graphic below.
Source: Google
The last feature Google highlights is "amazing imagery for exploring the world," of which the company observes, "of course, no map would be complete without amazing images for exploring the world." Oddly enough, Google is pointing out that its own latest mobile maps for Android and iOS are not as "complete" as Apple's own iOS 6 Maps.
"The new carousel gathers all Google Maps imagery in one spot enabling you to fly through cities," it notes, carefully avoiding the "Flyover" term Apple introduced a year ago. And again, only on the desktop, and currently only in an invite-only beta, can Google Maps users "find the Earth view which directly integrates the beautiful 3D experience from Google Earth into the new maps."
Source: Google
Google Maps 3D messes with Manhattan
Despite its years of experience in 2D digital mapping, Google's year late, non-mobile 3D Maps product is riddled with the same kind of glitches that Apple scrambled to address after the release of its own new Maps was greeted with contempt and derision. And users don't have to scour the planet to find undulating roads and smeared buildings in remote areas.AppleInsider reader Vesko Kateliev shared Google Map's above image of Midtown Manhattan (detailed at the native resolution, below), where roads turn into waterfalls and parked cars slide up the side of of a building as if trying to escape from a rolling wave of energy twisting buildings and bulging roads into the air.
Google Maps 3D still a work in progress
Apple's Flyover representation of the same area (below) is detailed enough to see that the building Google portrays as being smeared with taxis is actually a JC Penney, and you can even make out that the adjacent billboard is an iPad commercial. Apple even does a much better job at labels for points of interest and streets. Apple also labels 6th Avenue by its official name, "Avenue of the Americas," although a search of "6th Ave" also works.
Spin around Herald Square from the opposite direction and Google Map's 3D turns its trees into a strange pillar of goo (below top), a visualization that is clearly bested by Apple's detailed Flyover view in iOS 6 Maps (below bottom).
Google Maps 3D still a work in progress
While Google does a better job with major landmarks like the Empire State Building (below top), Apple's Flyover version is both much more detailed (an impressive feat given the processing power of the iPad compared to a desktop PC) and offers a clearer representation of its surroundings (visible in the two images below it).
Google Maps 3D still a work in progress
Apple advancing its own Maps
So far, there hasn't been any embittered contempt voiced by the tech media for Google's attempts to chase Apple's Flyover coattails with a seriously flawed offering that doesn't even work on mobile devices; the sloppy release of Google's own 3D product also calls into question the company's hubris in fueling smear campaigns against Apple's own mapping product last fall.Apple has been focused on enhancing its own product, meeting the needs of developers and hiring new staff to work on the project.
Additional advancement of Maps for iOS 7, and perhaps on the Mac in OS X 10.9, is expected to be announced next month at the company's Worldwide Developer Conference.
Google has apparently felt the pinch of losing its default position as the Maps app iOS users see on their Home screen, as just last month the company's chair and former Apple board member Eric Schmidt said, "we would still really like them to use our maps" as the default choice in iOS.
"It would be easy for them to take the app in the store and put it as their basic one," he observed.
Comments
Well?? We're waiting?? How are you going to spin this story?? How are you going to be Google's mouthpiece? Time to grab your ankles.
Not to mention, of course, the really scary part:
"Access to the new Google Maps also requires an invitation, which links your online session to your Google account, reinforcing the company's ad-centric business model."
You can't even look at a map without Google crawling into your shorts.
Fantastic post, DED.
????
"A year after Apple launched iOS 6 with Flyover, neither Google nor Nokia have a similar, integrated 3D visualization feature for their own mobile platforms"
Not true. This has been available in Google earth on mobile for about a year. You can view all this now without an invitation by using Google Earth for desktop, as you have been able to do for a year. The invitation is only for the new Google maps which combined earth and maps (finally).
I've always thought the criticism at Apple's (and Google's) 3D technology was misguided. It's a tremendously cool feature and I applaud both companies for this kind of innovation, as I have been from the first time Google introduced it.
"...where roads turn into waterfalls and parked cars slide up the side of of a building as if trying to escape from a rolling wave of energy twisting buildings and bulging roads into the air."
And yet no "Matrix" reference though, huh? "Whoa..."
Edit: Great article, by the way. It will be interesting to see if other media outlets pickup the topic.
Congrats.
Originally Posted by isaidso
"...where roads turn into waterfalls and parked cars slide up the side of of a building as if trying to escape from a rolling wave of energy twisting buildings and bulging roads into the air."
And yet no "Matrix" reference though, huh? "Whoa..."
Folding topography, I'd have thought Inception.
Quote:
Originally Posted by NexusPhan
"A year after Apple launched iOS 6 with Flyover, neither Google nor Nokia have a similar, integrated 3D visualization feature for their own mobile platforms"
Not true. This has been available in Google earth on mobile for about a year. You can view all this now without an invitation by using Google Earth for desktop, as you have been able to do for a year. The invitation is only for the new Google maps which combined earth and maps (finally).
I've always thought the criticism at Apple's (and Google's) 3D technology was misguided. It's a tremendously cool feature and I applaud both companies for this kind of innovation, as I have been from the first time Google introduced it.
The article references Google Earth rather prominently, but the key detail you ignored is "integrated."
It's not very useful to look up an address, then launch another app to see the environment around it, and then go back and forth between them. They also have a different interface. Apple's Maps app integrates 2D/3D and Flyover all in the same interface, making it easy to search and then explore the result.
Personally, I find 3D maps to be an unnecessary feature for what all I am trying to do is to get from point A to point B.
To paraphrase Schmidt: "just don't wear shorts."
[LIST]
[*] http://forums.appleinsider.com/t/152959/apple-ceo-tim-cook-apologizes-to-customers-for-maps-in-ios-6 (371 total comments)
[*] http://appleinsider.com/articles/12/09/25/inside_ios_6_whats_wrong_with_apples_new_maps (113 total comments)
[*] http://forums.appleinsider.com/t/152763/apple-working-hard-to-rectify-maps-issues-appreciates-customer-feedback (248 total comments)
[*] http://forums.appleinsider.com/t/153167/apple-improving-3d-flyover-visuals-in-ios-6-maps (100 total comments)
[/LIST]
If you're not wearing shorts in public then Jobs's infamous comment my arise: "You're holding it wrong."
These same Google-worshipping fanatics were not willing to give Apple, a company who has never been in the maps business, a pass over imperfections in a feature that Google didn't even have, will now make excuses for Google and will give them a pass for even worse distortions a year later, from a company who has been in the maps business for over a decade and is one of their core products. Just goes to show the utter vapidity and emptiness of these attacks, and the vile hypocrisy involved.
Will anyone bother setting up tumblr blogs showcasing these? Of course not.
Q: The Winged Serpent
Staypuft Marshmallow Man
The Independence Day aliens
Godzilla
Cloverfield
The Taliban
Loki and the Chitauri
Apple
Google
Sarah Jessica Parker
Let's face it, folks.
New York is just not as safe to live in as it used to be...
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpamSandwich
No one will care. In the opinion of the spinmeisters, Apple is bad and Apple's Maps are a disaster... no matter how much improved.
Make that "In the opinion of some spinmeisters, Apple is bad and Apple's Maps are a disaster"
In the opinion of other spinmeisters, Google is evil and Apple can do no wrong.
If you consider yourself an objective person, there are fanboyz and haters in every camp. Why pretend Apple is the underdog in all corners?
Quote:
Originally Posted by GTR
King Kong
Q: The Winged Serpent
Staypuft Marshmallow Man
The Independence Day aliens
Godzilla
Cloverfield
The Taliban
Loki and the Chitauri
Apple
Google
Sarah Jessica Parker
Let's face it, folks.
New York is just not as safe to live in as it used to be...
Don't forget the Foot Clan and nearly half the Marvel Universe.
Let's see, 3d flyover or street view, which is more useful?
I'm sorry, Apple just isn't there with useful mapping.
Actually, your "not true" is not true... The new desktop Google Maps (invite only) includes Street View, Google Earth and a "Picture Carousel". The implemention of Earth is different -- it doesn't zoom all the way out, rotate the earth, then zoom in -- but the underlying data and graphics are much the same for most places.
The highway at Hoover Dam still sags down the canyon walls, you still can't read [see] the sign on the Rose Bowl, you still don't get 3D of Versailles and most places
They have given a limited approximation of 3D for a few places -- but it is much more restricted than Apple Maps (4 45-degree rotations and 2 3D angles).
Here is something that you can do in Apple Maps, that you cannot do in either Standard Earth or Earth in Invite Google Desktop Maps.
[VIDEO]
Note the Apple Maps Zamboni
You can increase the video resolution to 1080p on the Mac or 720p on the iPad.
Oddly, this was created on an iPad 4 Retina at 2048 x 1536 -- and had to be scaled down to run on the Mac...