This is really, really cool. The ABC here does some interactive images like this [1] and I think I prefer their interface, but they're not usually high-res like this.
This sort of interactive image thing is really cool and helps engage users with the content far more than just side-by-side images.
edit: What always fascinates me about these sorts of pictures is the degree with which the old buildings are all still there. Coming from Australia, very little of our stuff tends to be 'old' and 200 years is just about the upper limit. It's just so foreign and abstract to me that it's always a little offputting and noticable.
Having grown up in Germany and now living in he US since many years gives me an interesting perspective on this. I am used to an environment that's filled with history like this. I remodeled a 300+ year old house!
I find that everything being new in the US makes you feel like you can truly change the world and accomplish anything you want. Being in Europe where most buildings have been around since forever makes you feel small and I find it comforting in a way to have my life put into perspective like that. Iceland had a even stronger impact on me that way because it was so obvious that the land itself had recently (in geological terms) been created and can destroy whatever you do as a human or at least make it all insignificant. I found that calming
"Iceland had a even stronger impact on me that way because it was so obvious that the land itself had recently (in geological terms) been created and can destroy whatever you do as a human or at least make it all insignificant."
Yeah, I can envision that.
America has something related, and related to your feeling about it that "you can truly change the world and accomplish anything you want". We're a land of natural disasters, but very very few of them are as severe and encompassing as the geological events in Iceland. So our disasters tend to invoke a response from the survivors to pick themselves up and rebuild. I had a "better" than front side seat to this starting in 2011: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Joplin_tornado
I wish there were an option to change the speed of the crossfade. The 2.5 second crossfade is nice but it'd be fun to try it at about 0.25 seconds, too.
One detail I always look at are the repair of buildings. e.g. the church in the picture still bears the damage (by the different color of stone), but is otherwise in the same state.
In Berlin, for example, a lot of the damage of the fights on the museum island visible or repair is very obvious.
This sort of interactive image thing is really cool and helps engage users with the content far more than just side-by-side images.
edit: What always fascinates me about these sorts of pictures is the degree with which the old buildings are all still there. Coming from Australia, very little of our stuff tends to be 'old' and 200 years is just about the upper limit. It's just so foreign and abstract to me that it's always a little offputting and noticable.
[1]: http://www.abc.net.au/news/specials/hurricane-sandy-before-a...