The reason there isn't much investment here is that it's expensive to update the image data and the result isn't very useful.

You barely ever need to look at 3D photogrammetry buildings for anything and there aren't many questions it answers outside of curiosity.

I do wonder if they could integrate street view images into it better.

Even old image data is pretty useful. If they could make a 3d view that seamlessly integrated satellite, plane, and street level imagery into one product, it would be a much better UX than having to manually switch to street view mode.

Well, almost all of satellite view is actually plane images. Satellite images aren't good enough resolution for 3D as far as I know.

The other problem is you can only update them in sunny weather. So SAR is a lot more useful because it can see through clouds.

it could be a service for local uses: you select an area and ask Google to render it. Could be even premium service hehe

Google uses texture mapped polygons instead of 3D Gaussians, so this wouldn't work for Google Maps. But there actually is a collection of libraries which does the same thing for polygonal data: https://vcg.isti.cnr.it/nexus/

One of the guys working on this is Federico Ponchio. His 2008 PhD thesis, which provided the core insight for Unreal Engine's Nanite, is referenced at bottom.

> Google uses texture mapped polygons instead of 3D Gaussians,

Time to switch I'd say...

Polygons are a poor fit, especially for trees and windows and stuff that needs to be semitransparent/fluffy.

I suspect the gaussians will compress better, and give better visual quality for a given amount of data downloaded and GPU VRAM. (the current polygon model uses absolutely loads of both, leading to a poor experience for those without the highest end computers and fast internet connections).

Google Maps has 3D (in some areas). Click on Layers -> More -> Globe view.

Looks like this: https://i.imgur.com/wcCJmbd.png

but thats desktop not mobile.

And when you zoom right into streets, storefronts and stuff are barely visible because they haven't properly integrated street level imagery.

I am really impressed by the Apple Maps implementation. I think it also uses textured polygons, but does so in a very good looking way and at 120 fps on an iPhone, showing even a whole city in textured 3d.

Apple bought a Swedish startup called C3 and their became 3D part of Apple Maps. That startup was a spin-off from Saab Aerospace, who had developed a vision system for terrain-following missiles. Saab ran a project with the municipal innovation agency in Linköping and the result was that they decided this tech should be possible to find civilian use cases for. C3 decided to fly small Cessnas in grids across a few major cities and also Hoover Dam, and built a ton of code on top of the already extremely solid foundation from Saab. The timing was impeccable (now many years ago) and they managed to get Microsoft, Apple and Samsung into a bidding war which drove up the price. But it was worth it for Apple to have solid 3D in Apple Maps and the tech has stood the test of time.

I remember seeing a Nokia or Here demo around that time that looked like similar or the same tech. Do you know anything published about it with technical details? Seems like enough time has passed that it would be more accessible. I would love to learn more about it.