Video Tracking with Google Maps

Ubipix allows anyone with a smartphone to capture, tag, upload and share video or photo collections and view the submissions on a Google Map.

Using the Ubipix application on your phone allows you to capture video alongside a GPS track. Once you have captured your video (or photographs)  you can view and share the video on the Ubipix website. The video is automatically synchronised with a Google Map, so as you watch a video you can also view the location of the camera and its direction during the video's capture.

Below the video and the Google Map you can also view other data, such as the speed and distance travelled whilst shooting the video.

Creating Heat Maps with the Google Maps API

HeatmapTool is a service for easily creating heat maps with the Google Maps API.

To create a heat map with HeatmapTool the user simply needs a comma separated values file (CSV) of their location data. The tool includes a number of options to customise the colors used, the size of the spot radius and the opacity of the heat map overlay.

The free version of HeatmapTool allows the user to create heat maps with up to 100 data points and allows for 500 hits per day.

Rebuilding L'Aquila with Google Maps

In 2009 an earthquake in the Italian city of L'Aquila caused the death of 308 people and damaged many of the town's historically important buildings. Noi L'Aquila is a Google Map developed by Google in partnership with the City of L'Aquila, the ANFE (Associazione Nazionale Famiglie Emigrati), the University of L'Aquila and the architect Barnaby Gunning.

The map aims to capture the memories of the citizens of L'Aquila and help speed up the reconstruction of the city. It provides a means for the town's inhabitants to record their memories of the town and at the same time to inspire the future of L'Aquila visualising its reconstruction with 3D models.

Users of the map can submit photographs and videos to a Google Map and also contribute text about their memories of locations throughout the town. The map also includes an option to view the town with the Google Earth browser plug-in. In the Inspire the Future section of the site users can contribute 3d models to help visualise and shape the reconstruction of the town.

German Bike Routes on Google Maps

Naviki is a German bike route application. The application uses Google Maps with OpenStreetMap cycling route data to help cyclists find the shortest or most cycle friendly route between two locations.

Users just need to add a starting location and a destination and select whether they want the shortest or the most bike friendly route. The bike friendly route takes into consideration altitudes and congestion in calculating a route optimised for cyclists.

The calculated route is displayed on a Google Map alongside an elevation profile and details such as the distance of the route and an estimated time for the journey. The waypoints of the calculated route can also be downloaded for GPS units.

Amsterdam Soil Quality on Google Maps

The Amsterdam City Council Planning Department has used the Google Maps API to provide a map of the city's soil quality.

Bodemkwaliteit Amsterdam displays a number of different zones in Amsterdam, demarcated by soil quality. The map can therefore be used to determine the potential re-use of excavated soil, from the location of its excavation. The different zones on the map are color-coded by type of soil. The green and blue zones on the map indicate cleaner soil and the red zones indicate heavily contaminated soil.

The Google Maps of the Week

Over the last couple of years there has been a number of clever promotional campaigns by companies using the Google Maps API (often taking advantage of Google Maps Street View imagery). Two of my favorite maps featured on Google Maps Mania this week were from Toyota and Moët & Chandon.

Both companies have managed to create campaigns with Google Maps that reflect some of the core values associated with their products and at the same time create interactions with potential customers.


Toyota has come up with one of the best Google Maps based promotional campaigns yet. To help promote the car the company are driving a Toyota IQ around with a 360 degree panoramic camera rig strapped to the roof. They are then capturing Street View images and filling in all the blanks on Google Maps.

The campaign, currently running in Belgium, allows anyone to report a street that doesn't have Street View on the Toyota IQ - Street View Google Map. The Toyota IQ then travels to the street, captures the Street View images and adds them to their Toyota IQ map.


If you can't afford to whisk the love of your life off for a romantic weekend in Paris you could try sending her a romantically tagged Street View image from the city instead. You never know it just might work.

Tag Your Love in the Streets is a nice Street View based promotional campaign by Moët & Chandon. Using the application you can select a Street View image from anywhere in the world and then add your own message. You can add text to the image and decorate the scene with a number of romantically themes images, such as flowers, hearts or a bottle of champagne.


The island of Sumatra in Indonesia has lost almost 50% of its tropical rainforest in the last 35 years. The World Wildlife Fund, Eyes on the Forest and Google Earth Outreach have joined forces to create a Google Map of land cover, land use, and land users in Sumatra.

Eyes on the Forest: Sumatra allows users to explore data about the island's conservation values, forest diversity and wildlife. The aim of the map is to increase transparency about the threats to the Sumatran environment and identify the drivers of deforestation and habitat destruction.

It is possible to view a number of data layers on the map, including the dwindling rainforest cover over the last 35 years, wildlife ranges, protected areas and natural carbon stores. 

Vintage Film on Google Maps

I've added a few more archive videos to my Street View application There and Then. The app allows you to watch historical films embedded on a Google Maps Street View image of the same scene, as it looks today. 

If you like this sort of thing you should also check out Historypin, which now also includes a few early film scenes, dotted in amongst all the user submitted historical photographs.

Drive the Indianapolis 800 in Street View

Google has added Street View imagery for the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. You can use the link above to visit the track on Google Maps.

However, for those too lazy to click the forward button 200 times, I've quickly put together an animated lap of the track. Check out the animation and make sure you press the 'speed x2' button for the full racing effect.

Via: Google Lat Long

Monitoring Water Points with Google Maps

Water for People is a Google Maps reporting system used to monitor and record data from tens of thousands of water points around the world.

Using smartphones community members, partners and volunteers are able to report the status of water points and whether a project is up and running, broken, or on the verge of disrepair and requiring maintenance.

Markers on the map are color-coded to instantly show if a water point has a high, medium, basic or no service.

Friday Fun with Google Maps

Street View Funny created this compilation video of over 850 funny Google Street Views posted on the site over the last few years.


Google has created a nice Street View Galleries Collection for those looking for a little virtual stroll around the world's art.


Here's a little clue about how long Google took to capture the Street View imagery in Estonia. This road in Tartu has different Street View imagery depending on which side of the road you drop the pegman icon.

One side of the road shows you Estonia in winter. Travel over the road and suddenly it's summer.