For a project I want to do something similar to what the Indiana Jones movies do and when a character flies from one country to another, I want the camera to move across a map of the Earth.

I am wondering what the best way to do this is. I don't really have any equipment to move my camera in that motion across a large map, and do not have a macro lens to zoom in real close to the map either. Maybe I can zoom in on a telephoto lens in order to give myself more movement range, but the more you zoom in on a telephoto, the harder it is to focus in a macro sense.

So I am wondering, is it possible to create this in post? But if I do, where I am going to find a map online that is enough pixels that you can zoom that far into without loosing too much resolution.
Is this possible do you think? Thank you for any input! I really appreciate it!

Try buying a real physical map and taking a still photograph of it and then importing that into your NLE at full resolution and keyframing the moves across the images of map. It's a pretty standard method these days.

Oh okay thank you very much. I tried this before, but I loose too much resolution by doing this when I zoom into it.

You need a high resolution still camera to start with (better than your current stills camera - 17.9 MP isn't that impressive these days) and you need to endure that your NLE is using the full resolution of the image, so that you can zoom in without it going soft.

Having a large map helps.

It’s a bit of a faff, but as Google earth scales accurately you can merge zooms quite well. I found that as long as you scale by using landmarks on the map, it’s not too bad. Zoom in until two objects are near the frame edges. Lakes and coastal features are easiest. Then you can match the resize and overlay. The small artefacts from the swap are at the edges and less obvious. There’s clearly issues with rights but they can be sorted.

Oh okay, so when you say merge zooms, you mean take a bunch of still photos google Earth and put them all together?

I haven't tried it, but I gather Google Earth Pro allows you to put together moves.

I once sent a Christmas video when Google Earth first came out to someone who lived in Australia, which I had to do by grabbing still by still, so that it could be animated in a NLE. This involved starting from a well known landmark here pulling out and flying around the world to the area where they lived in Australia. I even managed a circular move over their location. It worked pretty well, considering how it was done.

Oh okay thanks. I can try that. So I just take stills of google Earth in different stages of the movement and put it all together then? But the thing is, is that Premiere Pro will not allow a project to be enough pixels to put it all the stills next to each other though. Unless there is another way I am suppose to do it?

You could try experimenting with Photoshop.

Google Earth Studio: https://www.google.com/earth/studio/

I'm confused? Stills next to each other? Brian - I've Got Google Earth pro = never noticed that feature?

Ryan - do you ever actually experiment and try things? I just created a 40,000 x 1080 frame in photoshop and Premier says it is too big. It is happy with 34000x1080 however. I grabbed a dozen tracked google earth frames and stitched them up and the zooms are simple too. The time wasting thing is aligning the frames - but it just makes we wonder if instead of trying things yourself, you pop on here and ask? Why don't you ever seem to try things for real. For what it is worth - I think Google earth may be too detailed, so you might need to simplify - and also if you go in too close, you start to see features, so you'll have to decide.

In my Google Earth video, I used them has a image sequence, although I assembled them manually by inserting each still as 2 frames into the timeline using a copy of DV AVID I had at the time. This was when Google Earth first came out and it was rather basic.

I think it may now be in Google Earth Studio. although Pro has a movie maker feature under tools. However, I haven't used it,

couldn’t you also use a screen capture program to capture as google earth animates the location change? In movies like Indiana Jones I’d think they’d have an artist draw a map and animate the map and graphics like dotted lines in a program like After Effects.

I'm confused? Stills next to each other? Brian - I've Got Google Earth pro = never noticed that feature?

Ryan - do you ever actually experiment and try things? I just created a 40,000 x 1080 frame in photoshop and Premier says it is too big. It is happy with 34000x1080 however. I grabbed a dozen tracked google earth frames and stitched them up and the zooms are simple too. The time wasting thing is aligning the frames - but it just makes we wonder if instead of trying things yourself, you pop on here and ask? Why don't you ever seem to try things for real. For what it is worth - I think Google earth may be too detailed, so you might need to simplify - and also if you go in too close, you start to see features, so you'll have to decide.

Oh okay, I tried expirimenting with some things before I asked on here, but Premiere will not allow me to do something of that size. I can try photoshop.

couldn’t you also use a screen capture program to capture as google earth animates the location change? In movies like Indiana Jones I’d think they’d have an artist draw a map and animate the map and graphics like dotted lines in a program like After Effects.

Thanks for the suggestion. I tried this as well before, but the problem with google Earth is that when it animates the location changes, it keeps pausing constantly along the way, and it also skips several frames, and it looks really clunky and not smooth at all.

NO RYAN -Premiere is totally happy with a 34,000 x 1080 frame which lets you easily scan it. My point was that I found the biggest size it would not do then went smaller - you said it wont do big frames and it will!

Are you talking about the settings when making a new sequence in Premiere Pro, or do you mean importing a really big still frame?

In my case, a perfectly normal size 1980 x 1080 frame, then you bring in a mega wide by normal height frame created in photoshop and then you simple move it across the screen with keyframes as usual. works fine. No point creating a huge video frame just a normal one.

Oh okay I see, I thought before, you meant a really big aspect ratio in Premiere Pro, in order to put all the photos together. My mistake. I can try photoshop and see how it goes. Thanks.

But as for recording google Earth as it moves from location to another, another filmmaker I worked with before, was able to do this for his project, and google Earth moved smoothly. Was he able to do something to get it move smoother without pausing and skipping frames?

Animating a larger image is better than a video screen capture of google earth because it will be smoother and you have full control of the speed and movement of the animation. Don't get lazy.

Like many things, this comes down to having the right software. I make maps, and there are many ways that I can think of to do this. The examples that have been posted are a good try at problem-solving, but are pretty kludgy. :)

Here's a suggestion: install the free, open source Mobile Atlas Creator program - it runs on Macs, Windows and Linux. You will need to install Java if you don't already have it and that can be confusing unfortunately. I have written a tutorial for installing Mobile Atlas Creator and Java, you can read/download the PDF file here (I should update it again)

https://boydsmaps.com/mobile-atlas-creator/

I don't know what kind of map you want - there are many free sources of maps and imagery available. Here's a quick example using OpenStreetMap. I'll assume that you have followed the tutorial above and installed Mobile Atlas Creator.

Start the program and create a new atlas in OziExplorer format (see attached screenshots)

Now choose OpenStreetMap 4uMaps.eu as a mapsource and drag/zoom the map to the location you want. You must hold down the RIGHT mouse button to drag the map (not very intuitive)

Use the left mouse button to drag a box over the area you want. I suggest doing a quick test with very small area for starters.

The Zoom Levels checkboxes will select the resolution of the map. For a first test, choose a small zoom level. Each level is twice the scale of the previous which means 4x the amount of data. Level 15 is a resolution of 4 meters per pixel, which could produce a very large image depending on the area you select. ONLY CHECK ONE BOX here. This setting has nothing to do with the scale of the map in the viewer, you can zoom way out there to make it easy to select the area you want.

Click the Add Selection button and you should see it appear in the Atlas Content window.

Now click the Create Atlas button. When it finishes you can click the button to open the atlas folder. Open the enclosed folders and you will find a PNG image and another file that you don't need. In this example, it took around 30 seconds and created a 3584 × 2048 image. The speed of your internet connection will affect this, of course.

There are a lot of other built-in map sources you could try, the USGS has topo maps and aerial imagery, there are also free topo maps for Canada. Also possible to add other mapsources, but that gets complicated.

BTW, I should also add that using OpenStreetMap, USGS and the other built-in sources mentioned above, it will give you imagery that you are free to use in your movie (although you should probably mention them in the credits). Google Maps and imagery is copyrighted and if you want to play it by the book, you would need their permission.

That's good stuff Boyd - thanks for posting this.

Oh okay thanks. I can use OpenStreetMap or the other ones. OpenStreetMap doesn't look as good as google earth though. Can I use google Earth if I recolor it to black and white, and no names from there show up, for example, or is that not good enough? The problem with OpenStreetMap is that it says the names of way too many places on it, where as I want a map with no names or words on it if possible.

Most people would probably just create something specific in photoshop from scratch and draw all the relevant state lines roads etc. themselves.

If you can get OpenStrreetMap into Photoshop, you mat be able to remove the street names.

How many pages you think a simple map animation thread will be? Ryan can’t problem solve or think creatively to save his life. He needs to be constantly feed answers.

I just wonder sometimes! Is not graphics something everyone studied at school to at least the kind of level we're talking about here. As for the copyright issues - I cannot believe any younger person doesn't know how to plagiarise, steal, mimic or copy material? I thought they all learned this unofficially in their teens?

Pete is totally right though, Ryan as a multi-disciplinary producer seems so ill equipped to do the job. Everything is so hard, and learning so difficult.

Yes, I am seeing that seems to be the root of every issue that starts off every thread. It may be that in a job/environment where there are precise instructions for every single task, with no room for creative interpretation, and someone on hand all the time to give simple answers to questions that do come up, he would thrive (that’s probably what his day job entails—-he has one, dont think hes ever said what it was). But filmmaking or really any arts field is the opposite of all that and seems to be a bad fit for him.

Can I use google Earth if I recolor it to black and white, and no names from there show up, for example

Can I take one of your movies if I recolor it to black and white and no names from the credits show up, for example?

I just wonder sometimes! Is not graphics something everyone studied at school to at least the kind of level we're talking about here. As for the copyright issues - I cannot believe any younger person doesn't know how to plagiarise, steal, mimic or copy material? I thought they all learned this unofficially in their teens?

Pete is totally right though, Ryan as a multi-disciplinary producer seems so ill equipped to do the job. Everything is so hard, and learning so difficult.

Oh well it's just that every time I try to come up with creative ways to solve a problem, I keep running into more problems within that solution, and then more problems, within that solution, etc. So I get stuck because I am not sure what to do then.

The trouble Ryan is you have the ideas, but just can't come up with the way to do even these quite basic things. They're really very low down the difficulty list.

I just wonder sometimes! Is not graphics something everyone studied at school to at least the kind of level we're talking about here. As for the copyright issues - I cannot believe any younger person doesn't know how to plagiarise, steal, mimic or copy material? I thought they all learned this unofficially in their teens?

Pete is totally right though, Ryan as a multi-disciplinary producer seems so ill equipped to do the job. Everything is so hard, and learning so difficult.

Oh okay, well I am finding it difficult to animate a map, especially when every map has writing on you don't want. So I have to animate a map from almost scratch. Isn't that difficult even for the average person?

By laying blank paper on top, you can trace a source map and so create your own map without any writing over it, You can do this physically and scan it into you computer. You can then use your NLE to keyframe moves.

Alternately. if you've got Photoshop and the copyright free map, you can alter it so that you get the look you want. It's a matter of playing around with Photoshop and exporting a suitably high resolution file, Paul gave you the max you can use in Premiere earlier.

Let's be honest Ryan - the skills required to use photoshop are hardly as complex and tricky as many of the other things you do? You now have some really good map sources from people in this topic. Google earth pro - is free, and you can turn things off very easily. Alternatively you can find a million sources of maps, and very simply add texture to simulate terrain, as in the Indian Jones movie.

I'd forgotten it but I did a little local history photo thing years ago that has some map following - it's quite crude now, but hardly difficult, process wise.
https://youtu.be/w3-ClICz9PE

Oh okay, thanks. I've tried google Earth Pro, but I have to take freeze frames of it as I go, and have to erase all the google earth lables on the map and there are a lot mostly in the ocean areas. So I can use the clone stamp to get rid of them, but this takes some time to make it look good. But I am having trouble taking still frames of the land as I go because google Earth keeps changing it's angle and trajectory as I got, thereby leading to mismatches in trajectory from frame to frame, if that makes sense?

That method will have a certain animated "look" and you do need to practice the moves before you start capturing the frames, so that you get a feel for them.

If you want a smoother move try using the movie maker option in tools.

Speaking of "video map effects"..... I am developing a GPS/Mapping app using a very cool API called "maptalks". It was originally developed by YUM Brands in China for in-house use, analyzing locations to place KFC and Pizza Hut restaurants! The company then turned it into an open source project at github.

Anyway, Played with its 3d animation capabilities today and am very impressed. Just added a few lines of code to the app I'm writing to get these effects. These are running in realtime using map data from the New Jersey state mapservers. Could get much better performance with local data. I will add some kind of basic capablities like these to my finished app.

Chatsworth animation on Vimeo


Rt 623.mov on Vimeo

The second one has worked well.

Just found this while looking for something else. Pretty cool if you're serious about integrating maps into your video.

https://www.maptiler.com/news/2020/12/how-to-add-maps-into-your-video/

GEOlayers 3 on Vimeo

I wonder how hard that is to manipulate? Looks great but I bet it's a steep learning curve!

Looks pretty straightforward to me, although I did not dig very deep. However, I've been immersed in writing map software for the past few years so my frame of reference is a bit different. :-) For me, After Effects would be the "steep curve", since I haven't used it before and learning Adobe software is one of my least favorite activities!