Google Earth is ready to get a new 3D time-lapse feature which allows you to see how Earth has evolved from 1984 to 2020, enabling you to see how much the catastrophic effects of climate change have already affected the planet’s geography.
In a call with reporters this week, Rebecca Moore, director of Google Earth, Google Earth Engine, and Google Earth Outreach, said, “It’s best for a landscape view of our planet.” “Zooming in isn’t the point. It all comes down to zooming out. It’s all about taking a step back. We need to check on our one and only home.”
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The feature called Timelapse by Google will be available in Google Earth. To use it, open Google Earth and then click or tap on the Voyager tab (which has a ship’s wheel as an icon). You may use Google to find a place of interest or take one of Google’s five “guided tours” on topics such as forest change, urbanisation, warming temperatures, mining and renewable energy sources, and “the Earth’s delicate beauty.”
Google Earth 3D time-lapse imagery was created by combining more than 24 million satellite photos taken between 1984 and 2020 into a single 4.4 terapixel-sized video mosaic, according to the business. (A terapixel is one million megapixels, to give you an idea of scale).
The data for the time lapses was collected in collaboration with NASA, the US Geological Survey (USGS), the European Commission, and the European Space Agency (ESA).
“As we think about both climate change and climate action, timelapse and Google Earth sit at the intersection of research, technology, public-private partnerships, and the next generation,” Moore said.
It’s not the first time-lapse feature developed by the Google Earth team. The team first launched a time-lapse function in May 2013, showing 2D images of Earth from 1984 to 2012, and it updated it significantly in November 2016. The new feature, which was revealed on Thursday, provides a 3D time lapse of the Earth’s geological changes, enabling you to examine the changes in greater detail.
Google has also made 800 time-lapse videos of various locations around the world available for free download. Teachers, nonprofits, politicians, and others will be able to use them to demonstrate how Earth’s geography has changed over time, according to the company.
