New satellite maps of the year. Space photography

Google Map is one of the most popular services today. It provides users with the opportunity to observe our planet (and not only) from a satellite online at high quality and in real time (the sights of the planet). At some point, the primacy of the schematic view of the maps was taken over by the Open Street Maps application. Where everyone in the know can edit a map in the style of Wikipedia, but that doesn't change anything, and today Google Maps is the most popular online map service. The popularity of the maps of this company has been in the first place for many years due to the good quality of satellite images in any corner of the planet, even Yandex could not provide such quality in its homeland.

Google Maps Online

Google continues to improve its creation in the form of rendering of our planet, improving the quality and detail of surfaces. More recently, the company has improved its services using the new Landsat 8 satellite, which can photograph the surface of planet Earth at 15/30/100 meters resolution per elementary point. Base satellite imagery in real time was previously updated only in 2013. At that time, the application used images taken by the Landsat 7 satellite, it is also known for introducing some bugs and glitches into the work of maps. To compare the quality of the images taken by different satellites, pay attention to the screen below.

Images taken by different satellites

In the examples given on the screen, you can see that the image of the new satellite shows not only improved detail of terrestrial objects, but also more natural colors. Google announced that it has spent about 700 trillion pixels of graphics data on the next-generation mosaic of the earth's surface. Almost 43 thousand of the most powerful computers in the Google cloud worked for a week on the gluing of pictures.

How to use Google Maps online

Anywhere in the world you can use Google Maps online in high quality using your tablet, mobile phone or computer. Just follow the link https://google.com/maps/ or use the built-in map below and you can find the country, city and even the road to the museum by specifying the required search parameters. And for mobile devices you can download a special application that is more convenient to use.

To find your way to a laundry or a cafe that you often visit - just specify the addresses in the program line and you will no longer need to enter these data every time. In this case, you can not only view the paved road to the institution, but also familiarize yourself with the information that relates to this institution, for example, opening hours, contact details, etc.

Let's use an example to use a map from Google satellite 2018.

1. Go to the website or open the app on your mobile device.
2. You just need to point with the cursor or touch on the touch screen and you can view the details of the area.
3. In order to find out the distance between cities, click on one of them with the right mouse button and select "Measure distance" from the drop-down menu. Now the second point can be specified with the left mouse button. If necessary, the point can be dragged with the mouse to another location, the distance information will be updated.
4. To select the mode "Relief", "Cycle paths", "Traffic" - select the menu sign (three stripes) and press the desired option. If you are using apple devices, click the diamond icon with a layer and also on the option you want.
5. To take advantage of high quality 3D images, click on the rectangle in the lower left corner. It will say "Satellite", if you need to return to the map mode, press it again.
6. To select Street View mode, drag the yellow man to the desired area of \u200b\u200bthe map, or simply enter the exact location in the query line, preferably with your home address.
7. Google Maps high resolution allows you to view streets in historical mode, i.e. how they have changed over time. To do this, throw the little man to the right place on the map. Select the clock icon and slide the time slider to select the desired date.

Surprising facts about Google Maps

Features and benefits of online maps in real time

From the first days Google maps became a discovery for all users. They made it possible to look at maps in a new way, to draw attention to this tool in general in a new way. Everyone who went to the Internet back in 2005 was eager to immediately use online mapmi and see your city or country from the satellite.

It seems inconceivable, but today it is possible to view other planets of the solar system in the Google Maps application!

Planets in Google Maps

To do this, go to the web version of the program and maximize the image of the Earth with the mouse wheel. Other planets will appear in the block on the left, which you can select to view. There are all the planets of the solar system and a few more satellites. For example, Callisto is a satellite of Jupiter. True, the images do not allow viewing other planets as closely and in detail as is the case with the Earth.

Google satellite maps in 2018 will allow you to view the surface of the earth and settlements in excellent quality, which cannot be done using a regular map. When compiling paper and other versions of maps, natural colors, clear outlines of river banks, lakes, colors of land areas and other color schemes are omitted, which makes us poorly oriented. Looking at the desert area on a regular map, one can only guess what kind of vegetation or relief there is. Turning to Google Maps in real time, you can even see the color and shape of the fence at any address on another continent.

In contact with

Satellite map world allows you to quickly move around the planet between any settlements. Detailed map the world from the satellite in Russian:

Explore the schematic map or switch to the world map from the satellite in the lower left corner of the map. Schematic map of the world Is a plan of the countries of the world and cities with street names and house numbers in Russian. A schematic map of the world shows attractions and tourist attractions, the location of train stations, shops, restaurants and shopping centers, map highways cities. Satellite map of the world will allow you to view satellite photos of the city thanks to images from the Google Maps service.

You can zoom in on the online mapby scaling it to streets and house numbers. To change the scale, use the “+” (zoom in) and “-” (zoom out) icons located in the lower right corner of the map. You can also zoom in or out with the mouse wheel. The left mouse button zooms in on the map, the right button zooms out. With the mouse, you can move the interactive map in all directions by grasping any place on the map with the left mouse button.

Online interactive world map is a very convenient and modern guide for exploring the city, its districts and attractions, hotels, places of rest and entertainment. An online map of the world can not become an indispensable assistant for you in an independent journey. The interactive map is provided by Google Maps.

How satellite maps of the world are created:

The satellite, passing over the planet, scans the earth's surface and maps are drawn using software. More recently, several years ago, satellite maps showed the planet's surface from a height of several kilometers. Now technologies allow making satellite maps from a height of several meters, and in the near future technologies will make it possible to create satellite maps with details of up to 30 centimeters.

What to see on the satellite map of the world:

First of all, people look for their country, their hometown, street and house in which they live on the map. To do this, you can zoom in on a schematic map of the world to your city, and then turn on the "Satellite" mode in the lower left corner of the map. In the same way, you can travel all over the world online, exploring the sights of countries and cities in real time. Popular places that are often searched for on a satellite map: Reichstag in Berlin (Germany), Athenian Acropolis in Greece, Egyptian pyramids, Italy - Colosseum in Rome (Ancient Roman gladiatorial arena, Peterhof in Russia (west of St. Petersburg), Statue of Liberty in the USA - the symbol of America, the Eiffel Tower in Paris (France), the Great Wall of China.

They allow obtaining spatial information about the earth's surface in the visible and infrared ranges of electromagnetic wavelengths. They are able to detect passive reflected radiation from the earth's surface in the visible and near infrared ranges. In such systems, the radiation hits the appropriate sensors that generate electrical signals depending on the radiation intensity.

In optoelectronic remote sensing systems, as a rule, sensors with continuous line-by-line scanning are used. Can be distinguished linear, transverse and longitudinal scanning.

The total scan angle across the route is called the viewing angle, and the corresponding value on the Earth's surface is bandwidth.

Part of the data stream received from the satellite is called a scene. Schemes for cutting a stream into scenes, as well as their size for different satellites, differ.

Optical-electronic ERS systems carry out surveys in the optical range of electromagnetic waves.

Panchromatic the images occupy almost the entire visible range of the electromagnetic spectrum (0.45-0.90 microns), therefore they are black and white.

Multispectral (multispectral) imaging systems generate multiple individual images for broad spectral areas ranging from visible to infrared electromagnetic radiation. The greatest practical interest at the moment is represented by multispectral data from spacecraft of a new generation, including RapidEye (5 spectral zones) and WorldView-2 (8 zones).

New generation satellites of high and ultra-high resolution, as a rule, survey in panchromatic and multispectral modes.

Hyperspectralimaging systems form images simultaneously for narrow spectral zones in all parts of the spectral range. For hyperspectral imaging, it is not the number of spectral zones (channels) that is important, but the width of the zone (the smaller the better) and the sequence of measurements. So, a survey system with 20 channels will be hyperspectral if it covers the range of 0.50-070 microns, while the width of each spectral zone is not more than 0.01 microns, and a survey system with 20 separate channels covering the visible region of the spectrum , near, shortwave, mid and far infrared regions, will be considered multispectral.

Spatial resolution - a value that characterizes the size of the smallest objects distinguishable in the image. The factors influencing the spatial resolution are the parameters of the optoelectronic or radar system, as well as the orbital altitude, that is, the distance from the satellite to the captured object. The best spatial resolution is achieved when shooting in nadir, while deviating from nadir the resolution deteriorates. Space images can be of low (over 10 m), medium (10 to 2.5 m), high (2.5 to 1 m), and ultra-high (less than 1 m) resolution.

Radiometric resolution is determined by the sensitivity of the sensor to changes in the intensity of electromagnetic radiation. It is determined by the number of gradations of color values \u200b\u200bcorresponding to the transition from the brightness of absolutely "black" to absolutely "white", and is expressed in the number of bits per pixel in the image. This means that in the case of a radiometric resolution of 6 bits / pixel, we have only 64 color gradations, 8 bits / pixel - 256 gradations, 11 bits / pixel - 2048 gradations.

Many users are interested in online satellite maps, which make it possible to enjoy the view of our planet's favorite places from a bird's eye view. There are a lot of such services on the web, and all of their diversity should not be misleading - most of these sites use the classic API from Google Maps. However, there are also a number of resources that use their own tools to create high quality satellite maps. In this article, I will talk about the best high resolution satellite maps available online in 2017-2018, and also explain how to use them.

When creating satellite maps of the earth's surface, both images from space satellites and photos from special aircraft are usually used, which allow photographing at a bird's-eye flight (250-500 meters).

Satellite maps created in this way the highest quality permissions are regularly updated, and usually images from them are no more than 2-3 years old.

Most of the network services do not have the ability to create their own satellite maps. Usually they use maps from other, more powerful services (usually Google Maps). At the same time, at the bottom (or at the top) of the screen, you can find a mention of the copyright of any company to demonstrate these cards.

Viewing satellite maps in real time is now not available for the average user, since such tools are used primarily for military purposes. Users have access to maps, photos for which were taken over the past months (or even years). It should be understood that any military objects may be deliberately retouched in order to hide them from interested parties.

Let's move on to the description of the services that allow us to enjoy the capabilities of satellite maps.

Google Maps - high resolution view from space

Bing Maps - online satellite maps service

Among the cartographic online services decent quality cannot be ignored by the Bing Maps service, which is the brainchild of Microsoft. Like the other resources I have described, this site provides fairly high-quality photographs of surfaces created using satellite and aerial photography.

Bing Maps is one of the most popular mapping services in the United States.

The functionality of the service is similar to the analogs already described above:

At the same time, using the search button, you can determine the online location of a specific satellite, and by clicking on any satellite on the map, you will receive brief information about it (country, size, launch date, and so on).

Conclusion

To display high-resolution satellite maps online, you should use one of the listed by me network solutions... The most popular on a global scale is the Google Maps service, so I recommend using this resource to work with satellite maps online. If you are interested in viewing geolocations on the territory of the Russian Federation, then it is better to use the Yandex.Maps toolkit. The frequency of their updates in the relations of our country surpasses that of Google Maps.

Remember the movie "Men in Black", where Agent Kay through the orbital camera looked at his beloved, watering flowers in the yard of the house? The opportunity to see how our Earth looks from a satellite in real time attracts people from all over the world. Today we will tell - and show you! - the best fruits of modern Earth observation technologies.

Attention! If you see a dark screen, it means the cameras are in the shade. Screensaver or gray screen - no signal.

Usually we get only static satellite maps frozen in time - details are not updated for years, and an eternal summer day reigns on the street. Isn't it interesting to see how beautiful the Earth is from a satellite online in winter or at night? In addition, the quality of images in some regions of Russia and the CIS leaves much to be desired. But now all this is solved in one fell swoop - thanks, the Earth online from the satellite in real time is no longer a fantasy. Right on this page, you can join the thousands of people who are now watching the planet.

At an altitude of 400 kilometers above the planet, where the station is permanently located, NASA has installed, developed by private companies. The cosmonauts themselves or at the command of the Mission Control Center direct the cameras from which the data is transmitted. Thanks to manual control, we can see what the Earth looks like from a satellite online from all sides - its atmosphere, mountains, cities and oceans. And the mobility of the station allows one to examine half of the globe in an hour.

How does the broadcast take place?

Due to the fact that the cameras are located on the International Station, even insignificant details are noticeable to us, which are commented on by scientists, astronauts and professional journalists. However, our Earth is visible online from a satellite in real time thanks to the labor of a whole complex of people and machines - in addition to the already mentioned cosmonauts and the Control Center, the process involves satellite communication technologies, solar power batteries and technicians who translate and decode data. Accordingly, the broadcast has its own nuances - knowing them will help you see more and better understand what is happening on the screen.

Our observation point, an orbital station, moves at a tremendous speed - almost 28 thousand kilometers per hour, and orbits the Earth in 90-92 minutes. Half of this time, 45 minutes, the station hangs on the night side. And although on approach, the solar cells of the cameras can be powered by the light of the sunset, in the depths the electricity disappears - therefore, it is not always available from the satellite. At such times, the broadcast screen turns gray; it is worth a little wait, and you will meet the dawn together with the astronauts.

To find best time for observations, you will need our special satellite map of the Earth - it marks not only the time of passage of the space station, but also its exact position. So you can find out when to see your city from a space height, or find a station in the sky with binoculars or a telescope!

We have already mentioned that astronauts and ground control can change the aim of the cameras - they perform not only entertainment, but also scientific function. At such moments, the planet Earth from the satellite is not available in real time - a black or blue screensaver appears on the screen, or the moments already filmed are repeated. If there are no interruptions in satellite communications, the station is on the daytime side of the planet, and the background has suddenly changed, then the cameras are filming areas inaccessible to the public in connection with international treaties. Secret objects and forbidden territories are also closed on static maps, cleverly hidden by photo editors or simply overwritten. It remains only to wait for the moment when the situation in the world relaxes, and there will be no secrets from ordinary citizens.

Hidden opportunities

But don't be upset if the camera isn't working right now! When planet Earth cannot be shown online from satellite, astronauts and NASA find other entertainment for the audience. You will see the life inside the International Space Station, astronauts in zero gravity, who talk about their work and what kind of view of the Earth from the satellite will be shown next. Allows you to look into even the impressively large Mission Control Center. The only drawback is that even the speech of Russian cosmonauts is being translated into English so that the American employees who run the Center can understand it. It is currently impossible to turn off translation. Also, do not be surprised at the silence - comments are not always appropriate, and there is no permanent soundtrack yet.

For those who predict the route of cameras using the capabilities of a real-time satellite map of the Earth, we have a tip - check the date and time settings on your computer. The server that updates the map uses the given International Station motion formula and the time zone of your IP address to predict the position of the orbital cameras. The online map judges how the Earth looks from the satellite solely by the device time. If your clock is lagging or rushing relative to the time zone, the station will move east or west, respectively. The use of proxy servers and anonymizers will also affect the result.

You are a participant in a scientific program

Surely you have noticed that the quality of the image of the planet Earth from space live broadcast from the satellite often changes - the image is covered with squares or lags behind the sound track. In most cases, it is enough to check your Internet connection speed, disable other videos and download programs, or click on the HD button in the broadcast window. However, if there are interruptions, it is worth remembering that the planet is visible alive only thanks to a large-scale scientific experiment.

Yes, yes - the video on this page is transmitted for a reason. The cameras installed on the International Space Station are part of the High Definition Earth Viewing program, which is still being improved and developed. The cameras were installed by astronauts in conditions isolated from cold and dust, but they are exposed to harsh radiation from the side. Scientists are experimenting with the difficulties of seamless data transfer in space, ensuring that a map of the Earth from a satellite in good quality existed not only motionless, but also living, dynamic. The results will help improve existing channels and create new ones - even in orbit on Mars for the foreseeable future.

So stay in touch - new things appear in the world of space every day!