Spotted in air photo?
Randy Berbaum
spotted something that seemed odd. On the west side of AK there is an odd
"tree". This tree looks like a very tall pine but comparing it to
surrounding trees it would seem to be the size of a sequioia. It is also
growing out of a concrete pad with a building next to it, and a fence
around them both. I am assuming that this is a disguised cell tower, but
was wondering if anyone in-the-know knows for sure.
Randy
==========
Randy Berbaum
Champaign, IL
Randy Berbaum
: Yes, it's definitely interesting taking aerial tours of the whole
: property!
: Here is the "tree" you found:
: It's got to be a cell tower, I think.
Yep, that's the one. That's some of the best looking camo I have seen.
Very realistic.
BTW I am in the process of downloading lots of the pictures so I can print
them out and examine them in more detail without having to move them
around on the screen. It isn't easy. Each image (closeup mode) is made up
of 192 individual pieces that have to be put together like a jigsaw
puzzle. It takes lots of time but when you get it all together and print
it as a poster print (aprox 16 x 20") the detail can be impressive. :)
This process isn't for the impatient. Epcot took 2.5 weeks of spare time
to piece together the 30 photos. And that's just for one view direction. Now
I have to go back and get the other three views.
(disclaimer: I am doing this only for my own use to facilitate enjoying
the MS product and in no way will these images be sold, displayed or
posted to the web.)
Davey Boy 2
"Randy Berbaum" <rber...@bluestem.prairienet.org> wrote in message
news:e126k0$gp3$1...@wildfire.prairienet.org...
We have at least one of those next to the M4 between Jn's 12 and 13...
Which is probably no interest to anyone else as I live in the UK and have
far too much time on my hands :)
Gareth Slee
> We have at least one of those next to the M4 between Jn's 12 and 13...
> Which is probably no interest to anyone else as I live in the UK and have
> far too much time on my hands
Well I live near Jn 40 on the M4.
Although by replying probably means I have too much time on my hands too
:-)
--
Gareth
Random Thoughts and Interests
http://web.mac.com/gaslee/iWeb/Site/Blog/Blog.html
Davey Boy 2
"Gareth Slee" <gar....@ntlworld.com> wrote in message
news:op.s7k0g...@powerbook.local...
> On Thu, 06 Apr 2006 10:26:23 +0100, Davey Boy 2 <d...@s.p.i.com.spam>
> wrote:
>
>> We have at least one of those next to the M4 between Jn's 12 and 13...
>> Which is probably no interest to anyone else as I live in the UK and have
>> far too much time on my hands
>
>
> Well I live near Jn 40 on the M4.
> Although by replying probably means I have too much time on my hands too
> :-)
>
> --
> Gareth
Port Talbot area by chance?
Bet you can't see the tree from there - as the bridge probably gets in the
way!
Gareth Slee
> Port Talbot area by chance?
Yep!
> Bet you can't see the tree from there - as the bridge probably gets in
> the way!
and the smoke :-)
Rudeney
> Mike Carrato <mcar...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Yes, it's definitely interesting taking aerial tours of the whole
>> property!
>
>> Here is the "tree" you found:
>
>> http://tinyurl.com/znbh7
>
>> It's got to be a cell tower, I think.
>
> Yep, that's the one. That's some of the best looking camo I have seen.
> Very realistic.
We have several of those around town. Here in Birmingham, we have a lot of
those "Southern Pines" that look just like so these disguised towers really
blend in, except they are usually 10-20 feet taller than the surrounding
trees.
> BTW I am in the process of downloading lots of the pictures so I can
> print them out and examine them in more detail without having to move
> them
> around on the screen. It isn't easy. Each image (closeup mode) is
> made up of 192 individual pieces that have to be put together like a
> jigsaw
> puzzle. It takes lots of time but when you get it all together and
> print
> it as a poster print (aprox 16 x 20") the detail can be impressive. :)
> This process isn't for the impatient. Epcot took 2.5 weeks of spare
> time
> to piece together the 30 photos. And that's just for one view
> direction. Now I have to go back and get the other three views.
LOL! I actually did the exact same thing once with images from
www.globexplorer.com! I had an image that was over 100 megabytes as a JPG,
but I could scroll all around it. Unfortunately, I had a hard drive crash
and lost it, but I can offer some advice. Instead of trying to knit the
images together yourself, Photoshop does a good if you happen to have a copy
of that - even an older "elements" version has the function.
--
- RODNEY
elin...@verizon.net
camoflaged circular area at the very top. (I'm a former cell company
employee).
Jennifer Smith
---Jennifer Smith
"Randy Berbaum" <rber...@bluestem.prairienet.org> wrote in message
news:e126k0$gp3$1...@wildfire.prairienet.org...
Mike C
Randy Berbaum wrote:
> : Here is the "tree" you found:
>
> : http://tinyurl.com/znbh7
>
> : It's got to be a cell tower, I think.
>
> Yep, that's the one. That's some of the best looking camo I have seen.
> Very realistic.
>
> BTW I am in the process of downloading lots of the pictures so I can print
> them out and examine them in more detail without having to move them
> around on the screen. It isn't easy. Each image (closeup mode) is made up
> of 192 individual pieces that have to be put together like a jigsaw
> puzzle. It takes lots of time but when you get it all together and print
> it as a poster print (aprox 16 x 20") the detail can be impressive. :)
> This process isn't for the impatient. Epcot took 2.5 weeks of spare time
> to piece together the 30 photos. And that's just for one view direction. Now
> I have to go back and get the other three views.
>
Wow, you have a lot more patience than I do! How do you get to the
images themselves? There's no way to save the images directly, as far
as I can tell. You can either use something like "PrtSc" (print screen)
on Windows, or try to get the images programmatically through HTTP.
I do wish that Microsoft would stitch these images automatically, like
in their aerial view. The current interface is very clumsy for
navigation from block to block.
Mike C
Tom Moeller
to look like pine trees.
tom
"Jennifer Smith" <ms...@adelphia.net> wrote in message
news:Ms6dnTNAC97arajZ...@adelphia.com...
Randy Berbaum
: Wow, you have a lot more patience than I do! How do you get to the
: images themselves? There's no way to save the images directly, as far
: as I can tell. You can either use something like "PrtSc" (print screen)
: on Windows, or try to get the images programmatically through HTTP.
I just use "save frames as" under the files menu. It only saves the ones I
am currently looking at so it takes repeted saves and scrolls to get the
entire image but as you said I have lots of patience.
As to the other person who asked what editing software, I am using an old
copy of Elements, but it does not have any way to automate the placing of
the individual tiles so I have to place each of the 192 pieces as a
seperate layer. I am getting faster at this (each image rebuild is
faster). It currently takes about 15 min per full image (down from the
original 2 hours per image).
Pete...@aol.com
surrounding trees it would seem to be the size of a sequioia. >
Unfortunately it is way taller than the Tree of Life on the horizon.
So, panning from right to left you have Everest, Tree of Life, and fake
cell tower tree.
Rudeney
>
> As to the other person who asked what editing software, I am using an
> old copy of Elements, but it does not have any way to automate the
> placing of the individual tiles so I have to place each of the 192
> pieces as a seperate layer. I am getting faster at this (each image
> rebuild is faster). It currently takes about 15 min per full image
> (down from the original 2 hours per image).
Randy, I just looked at Elements 2.0 and it does have a "Photomerge"
function off the "File" menu. It does a decent job of automating knitting
together panoramic photos and if it can't find the matching areas, it makes
it easy to do it by hand. I just copied 16 frames from www.globexplorer.com
containing SE and put them together and it took less than 5 minutes (on my
slow PIII-500mhz). The only thing that I noticed with the globeexplorer
images is there are small discrepancies in them so in my image, parts of the
Monorail track don't lineup.
--
- RODNEY
Jeff
<rber...@bluestem.prairienet.org> said:
It's also cool to see, across the parking lot, the KS ride vehicles
heading out for a day on the savannah. I'll be riding soon!
--
Jeff
Your cadaverous pallor betrays an aura of foreboding...
almost as though you sense a disquieting metamorphosis...
Waaaay too much time til my next trip! (21 days)
Randy Berbaum
: Randy, I just looked at Elements 2.0 and it does have a "Photomerge"
: function off the "File" menu. It does a decent job of automating
: knitting together panoramic photos and if it can't find the matching
: areas, it makes it easy to do it by hand. I just copied 16 frames from
: www.globexplorer.com containing SE and put them together and it took
: less than 5 minutes (on my slow PIII-500mhz). The only thing that I
: noticed with the globeexplorer images is there are small discrepancies
: in them so in my image, parts of the Monorail track don't lineup.
Ok, I'll try that out. One way I sped up the process is to set the grid to
256 pixels in each direction (the size of the frames) and set snap to grid
on. This made the placement of each frame MUCH faster. Thats how I got the
time down to 15 min or so. I didn't try the merge function because I
thought it was more for stitching panoramas (where there is overlap
between individual images) and I have a much better program for that
(autostitch). So thanks for the tip. I'll try it and see if I get good
results. :)
mad_kow
Rudeney wrote:
>
> We have several of those around town. Here in Birmingham, we have a lot of
> those "Southern Pines" that look just like so these disguised towers really
> blend in, except they are usually 10-20 feet taller than the surrounding
> trees.
>
Hehe. Like that huge scraggly 'pine' next to I-59 as you are passing
through the Trussville area.
The tower in the picture is much more realistic.
Mad Kow
Lilith
don't get the regular set of options. Are you doing some sort of
screen capture?
BTW, you didn't mention emailing for free. :-)
Lilith
Randy Berbaum
: How do you get the indivdual parts? When I right click the image(s) I
: don't get the regular set of options. Are you doing some sort of
: screen capture?
No. In Netscape I just open the file menu and choose "save Frame as". This
saves all the frames (the name given to the small 256 x 256 pixel pieces
that make up the picture) that are on your screen (and slightly beyond).
So you do have to save the frames in one name, scan across to a new part
of the image, and save again, repete. Once I have all 192 pieces ( collect
them into one file folder and delete the excess (there is lots of extra
stuff saved besides the frames). BTW, the frames each are sequentially
numbered. The last digits are the frame number, the next to last group is
the zoom size, and the third to last is the image number. So I use the
image number as a file folder name to collect the frames for an entire
image. Oh, the image numbers are in no pattern (that I have discovered) so
keep track of the image numbers as you collect the frames so you know
which images are next to which.
Side note to Rodney. I tried the elements function you mentioned and it
won't work. Any image that includes forest or water (which nearly all
images do) confuses the program enough to make it crash. So I am back to
the sized grid and snap to grid.
Rudeney
I haven't seen the one in Trussville, but there are a few on Valleydale and
119. They don't necessarily look realistic, but they are well
disguised,except for the fact they are 20 feet taller than the surrounding
pines.
--
- RODNEY
Mike C
Randy,
I was at Blizzard Beach last week and went to that speed slide (forgot
the name)... the "tree" was in full view. MUCH taller than any other
tree in the area. I'd say 2-3 times higher than the tallest "real"
tree. Next time you make it to the top of the Blizzard Beach mountain,
check it out.
Mike C
J. Mance
"Mike C" <mwil...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1145850972.1...@v46g2000cwv.googlegroups.com...