While fascinating, it’s also very sobering to see a time-lapse of satellite imagery seeing our planet become developed, seeing rivers dry to a trickle, and glaciers slowly melt away.
Part of a Google Earth Time-lapse feature, you can see over a dozen videos from around the planet, going back over 37 years, to 1984.
While some of the development over time seems ordinary, other time-lapse snippets are sadly disturbing, like the drying of the Aral Sea.
Take a look at the tool here.
Inspired by the many shapes, forms, and topography of Barcelona, Márton Mogyorósy scours Google Earth to find places to explore, and then photographs them with the use of a drone.
His images are as varied as the makeup of this Spanish city, from curving apartment blocks to the hundreds of boats moored at the coastline. We love good aerial perspectives, and these are especially dynamic. Via Colossal:
I’ve always loved that Star Wars’ Tattooine scenes were filmed in Tunisia. It was exotic enough to fit the two-starred planet very well. The set pieces from George Lucas’ film still exist in the hot Tunisian desert, 35 years on, though they’re disintegrating slowly. Photographer Rä di Martino traveled to the desert and discovered the ruins of Luke Skywalker’s home planet, through the help of Google Earth. Via FastCo Design:
