
All basemaps containing coastlines will contain water out to as far as 30 km from the main coastline, but the color balancing of that water can not be guaranteed. Some exceptions may be made on a per case basis for the largest of the global inland water bodies. (9) All inland water bodies will contain valid imagery within a basemap. Why do some bodies of water appear poorly? Planet’s tonal balancing techniques attempt to minimize scene lines when possible but it is not always possible to remove all traces of these boundaries. (8) Seam lines may be present in areas where scenes come from captures on different dates. Why do some basemaps views include faint lines? Planet will always use the most recent imagery when possible to create a basemap. Planet’s newer constellation has improved optics and onboard systems to improve the image quality. (7) Outside of the natural appearance of 4-5 m data, some older Planet data may exhibit a lack of sharpness. Planet incorporates usable data whenever possible. (6) Due to orbital constraints and solar orientation relative to the surface at time of image capture, high latitude areas present far fewer opportunities for quality imaging. Why are things not showing up towards the North or South Pole? Many images that you will see in Google maps, for example, could be up to several years old. However it is not methodically updated in a published, traceable fashion, so it is not possible to know how old a certain pixel may be.

Other basemap providers may be manually updating certain areas of the basemap over time.
#Google maps satellite full#
Planet will make best efforts to achieve full coverage in all cases but can not guarantee this. (4) Automated Timelapse Basemaps may have gaps in coverage if Planet was unable to acquire quality imagery within the specific time lapse period due to Planet coverage limitations, cloud cover, or other reasons. Why do I see areas where there are no basemap images? Planet is actively working on techniques to find the best-of-breed solution to this problem. The other has the opposite effect: more saturation but fewer scene lines and more tonal consistency. Planet has two different color balancing approaches: one does not have any pixel artifacts but will result in more scene lines and less tonal consistency. (3) In some cases, especially with very bright pixels, Planet data may be saturated and may appear green or pink. Why are some of the pixels bright green or pink? This has the effect of making some parts of the basemap look ‘stripey.’ The benefit in this scenario, however, is that this basemap data are guaranteed to fit within the specific time lapse selected.
#Google maps satellite free#
Within a certain time span, Planet’s automated mosaicking algorithm selects the best cloud and snow free data that it can, but in some areas, especially in high elevations and high latitudes, snow or clouds simply can’t be avoided for months on end. That means that users can switch between basemaps created from data collected at different times, for example a January basemap or a Q1 basemap. (2) Planet uses “seasonal” imagery to create an interactive basemap layer. Why does the image look spotty or have sharp lines? Planet captures at roughly 4 m resolution whereas some other providers capture at sub-meter. Planet data are captured at lower resolution than some data which Google and other map providers use in our basemaps.

This vision depends on having many small satellites in orbit, and an intentional trade-off in frequency over spatial resolution. (1) Planet’s vision is to image the whole earth, every day. Click the 2-D button to go back into "direct overhead" view.īefore this feature, the only way you could do this was to zoom around in Google Earth, which takes longer to load and has a bit of a learning curve to effectively fly around.Why are the features not as sharp in Planet data? (Yes, a mouse with a scroll wheel is a big help here.) Use the scroll wheel on your mouse to zoom in and out. Hold down the control key on your keyboard, and left click and drag. (Yes, it still looks pretty useless, but wait, it gets better!)Ĭlick the “3D” button in the lower right corner. Zoom into your favorite mountain in Google maps.Ĭhange to satellite view by clicking the satellite icon in the lower left corner. (Open Google maps up a new browser tab and give it a try!) This is great for scoping out your next backcountry adventure. Here’s a very cool yet little known function in Google maps - Satellite view 3-D fly around, which makes Google maps behave pretty much like Google Earth.
