Slashgeo

The TechCrunch blog has a story up along with video detailing the most photo realistic virtual world i've seen yet so far. Just another virtual world story you say, however the claim is it will run in web browsers (with no plugin) and even on mobile devices at photo realistic quality with full user control. This is all thanks to the beauty of server side 3D rendering (cloud computing). From their article : "The video shows a massive virtual city filled with towering skyscrapers, parks, user-customized apartments and houses, public meeting places, subways, and everything else you might expect in a metropolitan area, all beautifully rendered by the OTOY engine. The game also features impressive real time lighting, reflection, and weather effects that rival those seen in detailed 3D games (and even some movies)."

The Virtual Earth blog informs us about the new iSynth software, bringing Microsoft's Photosynth to the iPhone. From the blog: "iSynth brings all the eye candy of Photosynth to the user experience of iPhone making it a fantastic way to explore synths. You can search, browse and view synths right on your phone effortlessly. The application was developed outside of Microsoft by Greg Pascale, but we wholeheartedly think the application is great!" See also previous Photosynth stories below.

Slashdot discusses the following story, Microsoft's Augmented Reality, Video Photosynth. Their summary: "Microsoft demonstrated new augmented-reality software for cell-phones at the 2009 TechFest conference, which was held this week in Redmond. Instead of using GPS or WiFi triangulation, the prototype system relies entirely on scene-recognition to identify its position and add virtual objects to a video picture of the real world. TechFest is a showcase for lots of projects at Microsoft's various research labs. Other technologies on show included Photosynth for video, an image-tracking system for handwriting, a way of refining image searches using colors, and a 3-D version of Microsoft Surface." See also numerous related stories below.

iPhone owners can use Virtual Earth on the iPhone. From the entry: " Perhaps you’ve heard that the Live Labs team launched a free version of the Seadragon browser for iPhone…perhaps not. While the viewer is awesome and provides a killer photo viewer (arguably better than what comes with the iPhone) it also has Microsoft Virtual Earth included natively in the application. The application lets you navigate the world in Road, Aerial and Hybrid modes (sorry, no Birds Eye). [...] Also, Photosynth exploration and viewing is included in the release. I searched for “Pendleton” and you just have to love the auto-complete feature because sure enough as I was typing my “CP MS VE TE” synth came to the top (poor picture from my camera phone)." Seadragon is the first Microsoft app for Apple's iPhone, and it's free. See also related stories below.

Microsoft announced you can now search for Photosynth photos directly in Virtual Earth. From the entry: "In the welcome pane, you’ll see a link for “Explore Collections” which you click and begin seeing all kinds of collections. You can then improve your search using a helpful toolbar based on tags, collections with photos, collections with 3D models, collections with MapCruncher layers, and collections with Photosynths! Additionally, you can sort these by relevance (if you input a search term), distance from the center of the map, date added and last updated. Click the Photosynth button and you’ll see a search result list of Photosynth collections." Some related Photosynth stories below. Photosynth.net requires MS Windows.

Yesterday Microsoft announced GeoSynth. From the press release [scroll previous link to the bottom of the entry]: "GeoSynth, currently a standalone application, is comprised of a Viewer and Collection Builder which provides the same incredible capabilities as Photosynth. Users who require offline processing, storage and access of Synths will now be able to use GeoSynth behind their firewalls, on private or classified networks, and on portable platforms. Ongoing development will permit standard geo-tagged photos to be used as input and allow generation of geodetically referenced 3D Synths which can be quantitatively analyzed and combined with other geospatial products. Accurate geo-positioning, using rigorous photogrammetric methodologies, is a fundamental objective of GeoSynth." See also our previous PhotoSynth stories below.

All Points Blog have an interesting entry on a new Microsoft geovisualization platform named the Microsoft Single View Platform. From the entry: "Microsoft SVP is an open, industry standards–based technology that provides a highly integrated foundation for a variety of data visualization solutions in the area of business intelligence, information sharing, work flow and business processes, project management and systems center. [...] The Microsoft SVP foundation architecture is based on the following core technologies: Microsoft Virtual Earth, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007; Exchange Server; Office Communications Server, Microsoft SQL Server, Windows Server" Other Microsoft geostories.

Slashdot ran a story this weekend named Microsoft's Mundie Sees a Future In Spatial Computing. Their summary: "Speaking at the MIT Emerging Technology Conference, Microsoft Chief Research and Strategy Officer Craig Mundie explained that he sees the industry evolving into 'spatial computing,' and he envisions a 3-D virtual world populated by virtual presences, using a combination of client and cloud services. 'In a few months, the compay plans to test a new virtual reception assistant in some of its campus buildings. The assistant, which takes the form of an avatar, helps schedule shuttle reservations to get people to various locations across the 10-million-square-foot Redmond, Wash., campus. The system includes array microphones and natural language processing by which the avatar listens to the subjects and then interacts with them in real time. The system has been programmed to differentiate people by their clothing. Someone in a suit, for instance, would more likely be a visitor and not a potential shuttle rider." The GeoCLoud and Microsoft's Virtual Earth 6.2 has been discussed recently, see related stories below.

Microsoft just released Virtual Earth 6.2 and Virtual Earth Web Services 1.0. The quantity of new features is huge and are worth taking a look at, here's the highlights but follow the link for the details: " # Maps for Mobile Devices. # Bird’s Eye Views and Bird’s Eye Hybrid. # Aerial Imagery. # 3D Imagery. # Geocoding and Reverse Geocoding. # International Geocoding. # Localized Directions. # Localized Maps. # Extended International Parsing Capabilities. # Expanded Number of Rooftop Views. # Near-Matching Capabilities. # Imagery Metadata. # New Virtual Earth Web Services. # One-Click Directions. # Shapes and Shape Layers. # Pushpin Clustering. # Landmark-Based Routing. # Driving Directions with Traffic-Based Routing. # Walking Directions. # Multipoint Routing. # Traffic Reports. # GeoRSS Feeds. " I expect geoblog reactions in the coming days and will share them with our users. See also related stories below, Microsoft has been very busy lately with their geoservices.

Slashdot has a discussion currently about some new updates to Photosynth. Make sure to check out the video before the site goes down. Here is their summary : "STFS Found an update to the PhotoSynth stories that we already ran. You might remember the amazing photo tourism demos. Well this new version kicks things up several notches with paths and color correction to more smoothly transition between photos taken in different lighting conditions. As before, this stuff is worth your time. Check it out."

Here's this week's geonews that did not directly made it to our main page. Sean Gillies offers an entry on the application of REST. TMR links to another U.S. unemployment and job losses map. Vish discusses the changes and confusion about EPSG 3785 and 3857 and the potential impacts. For those of us getting old, see this blog entry on successfully installing and running ArcView 1.0, screenshots included. The Google Geo Developers blog have an entry on new open source tabs, markers, and controls libraries. The GEB has an entry on a flood of new user-generated 3D buildings in Google Earth and another one on a shaded relief map for Google Earth. The FGT blog has an informative entry on a list of towns and cities in a country with coordinates and elevation. APB have entries on location-based SMS, on Maine using open source and open standards to deliver their geospatial services and finally, links to an article about using Microsoft's Photosynth for disaster relief. See also some related stories below.