Google Street View is an incredible tool for aiding in navigation or even getting a ground level look at an area. Aside from the Google operated Street View Cars and Trekkers, there is a vibrant community of Local Guides who also make amazing contributions to the Map. I can’t think of a more prolific contributor than @MarcoDavoli who created brand new ‘Blue Lines’ and gave all of us amazing views of Salvation Island and La Maddalena.
But, venture off the Blue Lines and you can find “hidden” 360° Photo Spheres everywhere. The hunt for the stand-alone Spheres can be fun and rewarding. Some of the best Spheres that our community created were even highlighted on a Top 100 Spheres Leaderboard & Gallery.
Finding Photo Spheres takes just a few steps. I search for them on my PC to get the best view, but these instructions carry over to the Maps app within the Layers button.
First, find a location that you’d like to check out. Then, hover over the Layers button until the horizontal options menu appear. From there, click on ‘More’ and select ‘Street View’ from the pop up menu.
Now comes the fun part; hunting around the Map until you find a blue circle. I like to keep the Default layer up to provide good contrast. That circle will bring you to a Photo Sphere!
Hovering over the dot will give you a small preview of what it contains and clicking on it will open the Photo Sphere. Let’s take a look at what the dot above was hiding
Click and drag your mouse around to view the full 360° and even use your mouse wheel to zoom in and out. You’re now able to be fully immersed in an area that could be off any blue line, road, or a Point of Interest. See what the locals see. See what a Map Contributor or fellow LG wanted people to see about an area. Just have fun and explore!
If you find some cool Photo Spheres, post them in the comments.
.
.
The main image for this post was created using ChatGPT and is not licensed
An excellent How To post @JustJake. As I have mentioned many times, I love the immersive feeling one gets from 360 spheres and it is a real shame that I had to make the decision to stop producing the Top 100 Google Maps Local Guides Star 360 Spheres leaderboards.
Thank you, @AdamGT. The shutdown of that Board started my thinking about this post. Judging by the response so far, maybe I should’ve just followed your lead
Tu publicación es una gran idea para compartir imágenes 360 realmente interesantes @JustJake, y por supuesto que quiero compartir al menos una de ellas.
Aprovechando que el 19 de abril seré el host de un meetup dentro de la iniciativa #LocalGuidesCleantheWorld les comparto una foto 360 desde el punto más alto del recorrido que vamos a hacer ese día. Esto puede darles una idea de las vistas increíbles que tendremos durante nuestro meetup, en un lugar dentro de la Ciudad de México que esta en peligro de ser devorado por la mancha urbana.
What a great post dear @JustJake ,
I do love 360° photos even if I’m not an expert.
I saw many good example and I understood that I’ve to learn a lot. As you know I am more involved into StreetView; and thanks for tag me.
Very nice. I recognize that location. The drone footage is so clear, I can even see the spot where I parked last time I went there a few years ago.
Sorry, the tests I ran were on a slow computer and I did it without attempting to capture any links to share. Will take another look if this thread gets a bit more active.
360s are the best and most immersive, i’m kinda gutted that people cannot just add 360s to any coordinates any more. I often find the 360s at the most interesting places… for me at least, but that’s probably because it’s the only way to view these cool locations via google maps, because there is no POI for example. but then you get one kind soul who takes some crazy ultra quality drone footage and bam, you are practically there.
I think I mostly end up checking out 360s on coastlines, islands, war related places, military stuff.
I watch a variety of youtubers, some ww2 history, explorers, metal detectorists, treasure hunters (UK, AUS, US, Europe) and I always go checking on google maps around the areas they have been exploring, almost always a bunch of 360s in the middle of nowhere close by to where they were
Spotted a bunch of under sea 360s yesterday… Google Sea View - you heard it hear first : ))
those are incredible 360 images. I’d like to know how they did them, maybe with an adapter for the drone.
I found a good and easy app that take your 360 photo, if needed it correct/modify the geo position and upload to Gmaps in the place you like with also your captions.
Have a look at PANORRA, is an mobile app.
I’m looking at this (study and try) since few days.
I know that if you are using an android mobile it can take “native” 360 photo. More or less like what we did with “StreetView app”. Not so nice and easy to take a 360 photo but is an way to do without special equipment.
In general, if I am not wrong, standard or 360 photo can be uploaded “easily” only on a POI not in a generic spot.
At the end, if you want to ad 360 or PHOTO in any place you want you need a dedicated software.
There is also the interesting suite UL2GSV made by Dean Z . If you do not know I suggest to have a look at it. Really easy to google it.
