Google Maps adds 'Outer Space View' to Street View with stunning ISS photos
Google's Street View has arrived in space.
You can now explore the International Space Station via Google's Street View. It's the first (but hopefully not the last) time Google has taken its Street View outside of Earth.
Navigating the ISS' Street View images is a little different than Google Maps' typical setup. You still pan around a particular area by clicking around on the image, just as you would in a typical Street View, but Google also added special annotations to the ISS images.
The notes explain the significance of what you're looking at, with additional context on items around the space station. You can also click into certain areas for a more detailed view.
The images are even more impressive considering the lengths Google and NASA's Johnson Space Center went to in order to get the photos. Collecting images in space posed a couple unique challenges, according to Thomas Pesquet, the European Space Agency astronaut who worked with Google to capture the images.
Google's typical Street View rig wasn't practical for the space station's zero gravity conditions so instead they improvised using the DSLR cameras that were already onboard the ISS. His stills were then stitched together to create the 360-degree views you see now.
Pesquet says they "did a lot of troubleshooting" before they could get the images right. "The ISS has technical equipment on all surfaces, with lots of cables and a complicated layout with modules shooting off in all directions—left, right, up, down," he writes. "And it’s a busy place, with six crew members carrying out research and maintenance activities 12 hours a day."
Luckily for us, his hard work paid off.
Topics Google
Karissa was Mashable's Senior Tech Reporter, and is based in San Francisco. She covers social media platforms, Silicon Valley, and the many ways technology is changing our lives. Her work has also appeared in Wired, Macworld, Popular Mechanics, and The Wirecutter. In her free time, she enjoys snowboarding and watching too many cat videos on Instagram. Follow her on Twitter @karissabe.
