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Google comes up with 360-degree Street View allowing people explore and navigate a neighbourhood through panoramic images

Picture this. You are a travel enthusiast from Bangladesh and are planning to visit historic locations worldwide. Sitting at home in front of your laptop or smartphone, you want to know different aspects of the Taj Mahal and also have a 360-degree panoramic view of the monument before actually visiting it.

You suddenly decide to visit the rest of the complex some other day and check out Angkor Wat instead. In a matter of a few seconds, you are transported to the ancient Buddhist archaeological monument complex in Cambodia and find yourself looking at the intricate carvings on the largest religious monument in the world.

Sounds far-fetched? Not quite, at least not in the virtual world. This is possible now as Google has come up with Street View that allows people to virtually explore and navigate a neighbourhood through 360-degree panoramic images.

After bringing iconic global landmarks like France’s Eiffel Tower, America’s Grand Canyon, Japan’s Mount Fuji and one of the oldest heritage monuments in the world — Angkor Wat temple, in Cambodia, among others, alive on the internet through its visual ‘walkthroughs’, the latest addition to the imagery is the famous Giza Pyramids of Egypt.

Once completed, users of Google Maps will able to get a complete view of the Pyramids of Giza, and five other landmarks in Egypt, namely necropolis of Saqqara, the Citadel of Qaitbay, the Cairo Citadel, the Hanging Church and the ancient city of Abu Mena.

How it is done

How the project is done, in itself, an interesting exercise. Trekker, a Street View camera system (a wearable backpack with a camera system on top), photographs the sites and captures 360-degree imagery of these monuments. Trekker is specially designed to capture imagery in remote sites or places only accessible by foot. It has already travelled to the Grand Canyon, Mount Fuji, the Galapagos Islands and even the historic pedestrian paths of Venice to make the world’s diverse heritage and beauty accessible to everyone.

Trekker will automatically gather images as it goes. There are 15 lenses at the top of the Trekker mast, each pointed in a different direction, enabling it to capture a 360-degree view. When the imagery goes live, one can simply search for one of the iconic sites. And once zoomed in, one will be able to pan around and check the imagery from various angles.

Over 90,000 images of Angkor were captured by Google using its Street View cars, which drove around the area and Street View Trekkers, who hiked around the temple complexes with the cameras mounted on their back. According to Google, this is one of their largest digital renderings of a world heritage site and the project was completed in a little over two months’ time since it began.

The Journey

Launched in 2007, Street View is a part of Google Maps Google Street View so far included over 3,000 cities and over 50 countries across the world. Over 90,000 images of Angkor were captured by Google using its Street View cars, which drove around the area, and Street View Trekkers, who hiked around the temple complexes with the cameras mounted on their back.

A similar initiative has also been launched in Bangladesh earlier in 2013. Once completed, Google Maps would start showing streets, attractions and major establishments of Dhaka and Chittagong cities in 360-degree street-level imageries.