We repeated this process with nearby composite meshes collapsed into larger and larger composite meshes. Smaller buildings were removed since they generally won't be visible when the lower-detail level is displayed. We then took nearby buildings and created a single composite mesh that included all the buildings and a single associated texture atlas. Initially, we created a single texture atlas from the source textures for the building.
#VITUAL EARTH 3D FULL#
The source data has a full detail geometry model and a texture map for each building face.
To improve performance, first we created multiple levels of detail for the building models. The fully textured buildings presented a real challenge because of the amount of data that can be visible in a single scene (each of the surface textures generated by the Virtual Earth automated process is unique). We started by using standard terrain-rendering techniques to create the surface mesh with high detail in the foreground of the scene and lower detail as you move away from the camera. Even so, we needed to reduce the file sizes. The data would have to be hosted on a large server and transmitted to the client as needed. So it was immediately obvious that we would not be able to host all this data locally on the user's PC. This control allows application developers to create mapping or visualization apps that show real-world locations with a level of detail that gives the user the experience of actually "being there."įigure 1 (Click the image for a larger view)Īs you might expect, the data required to visualize the world at the resolution we wanted was many tens of terabytes in size. To create the Virtual Earth 3D control, the team developed techniques for automatically generating 3D textured models of structures in the real world based on aerial photography with resolutions better than 12 inches.
#VITUAL EARTH 3D HOW TO#
We will also be documenting and providing samples of how to write and use your own plug-in extensions to change the control model, add your own data to the scene, and more.
For those not doing Web development, there will soon be SDK documentation available on how to embed the control directly in your own Windows® Forms or native application. Web developers who use the SDK to integrate mapping functions into their Web sites will now be able to show a 3D view with no additional work. The beta release integrates seamlessly with the JScript® API available in the Virtual Earth SDK. One of the primary goals of the Virtual Earth 3D team's project was to enable developers to build their own applications. NET Framework security model gives users the capability of dynamically loading plug-ins to supply data, but restricting them to execution in a partial-trust environment. Rather than a standalone application, Virtual Earth™ 3D is implemented as a managed control, which allows seamless integration with Web sites or standalone applications. The Virtual Earth 3D control is a new tool released by Microsoft for visualizing the entire world in three dimensions.
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