Google brings the Amazon Rain Forest to Street View
Say what!?!? Ya, Google has been on expedition in the Amazon and after a years trek, has made it possible to head to the Rain Forest in Street View. The project got started a year ago when the Amazonas Sustainable Foundation partnered with Google and invited the company to come down for a visit. Needless to say, a handful of employees took them up on the offer and away they went. They ended up traveling to the Amazon basin and started collecting ground level photos of the rivers, forest and surrounding communities in the Rio Negro Reserve.
To make it more than just a photo shoot, the team took a Google Street View trike along for the ride. The trike was equipped with a fisheye lens and then mounted to a boat. They traveled up and down the Amazon river and even ventured up some of its tributaries. Over 50,000 still images were captured and then stitched together to provide the world a look at the area using Street View.
“Take a virtual boat ride down the main section of the Rio Negro, and float up into the smaller tributaries where the forest is flooded,” project lead for Google Street View in the Amazon Karin Tuxen-Bettman wrote in a statement. “Stroll along the paths of Tumbira, the largest community in the Reserve… Enjoy a hike through along an Amazon forest trail and see where Brazil nuts are harvested.”
Is there any place Google can’t go?? When are they going to do a Street View of the Moon, or the Space Station? Seriously though, you get to check out the Reserve, take a virtual tour down the Amazon and even a stroll through the forest. While many of us dream about an experience like that in our life time, only a few of us will ever live it. Thanks to Google, at least you can see it.
