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Import of Google 3D Cities

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vvoovv edited this page Jan 14, 2024 · 42 revisions

Introduction

Import of Google's photorealistic 3D cities was made possible after the experimental release of Photorealistic 3D Tiles by Google via public 3D Tiles API. Photorealistic 3D Tiles are a seamless 3D mesh textured with high resolution imagery. The term Google 3D Tiles will be used below in this documentation page. Google 3D Tiles can be used to visualize over 2500 cities across 49 countries. The list of countries with 3D data (buildings, trees) can be found here. To see the exact borders of the areas with 3D data, open Google Earth in your browser, toggle the list of layers by pressing the button Layers and activate the layer 3D coverage in the list of layers.

By using Google 3D Tiles you are bound by

Also review:

Google 3D Tiles Key

For using Google 3D Tiles you need a 3D Tiles Key. A valid bank card number is needed to setup a billing account required to get the 3D Tiles Key. However each month you will get a free $200 credit from Google Maps Platform. Google's detailed instruction on getting the 3D Tiles Key can be found here.

Don't forget to enable the Maps Tiles API as described here. Also, you shouldn't apply any restrictions to your 3D Tiles Key.

Once you got the 3D Tiles Key, enter it in the field 3D Tiles Key in the addon preferences.

Warning

Please be extremely careful with importing large areas and using higher levels of details set in the drop-down list in the image below. That may lead to

  • A very long time to download and import Google 3D Tiles for your area of interest
  • Exceeding your quote at Google Cloud
  • A huge number of triangles in the resulting mesh. For example, the central part of Amsterdam with the size 2.3x1.5 km imported with the level of details building with details contains more then 2.5 million triangles. It is composed of more than 500 3D Tiles which takes a considerable time to download and import.

Also note, that Google Cloud returns a significant number of 3D Tiles beyond the requested area of interest.

That's why we recommend starting from a small area, say 1x1 km and the level of details set to groups of buildings or separate buildings.

Note that the lowest level of details is whole city and the highest one is buildings with more details.

Basic Usage

  • The addon panel is located on the Blosm tab of the right side panel of the Blender 3D View. The panel is toggled with the N key.
  • Set the value of the drop-down list to Google 3D Tiles.
  • Press the button select to select a map extent for your area of interest. A browser window pops up with the special page to select the map extent. Follow the instructions on the webpage. At the end of this step you will have a string with coordinates copied to the clipboard. Now return back to Blender.
  • Press the button paste to paste the coordinates of your area of interest.
  • Select a desired level of details in the drop-down list after reading the warning above.
  • Set the option Viewport Shading to Material Preview or Rendered to see a textured scene. The option is normally located at the top of the Blender 3D View as shown on the screenshot.
  • Press the button import to start download and import of Google 3D Tiles.
  • Enjoy the imported photorealistic scene!

Import Settings

Join 3D Tiles objects
If checked, the imported 3D Tiles will be merged into a single Blender object, double vertices will be deleted. Otherwise each 3D Tile will be preserved as as a separate Blender object.

Relative to initial import
If checked, the current import will be made relative to the initial one instead of Blender's zero point, provided that there were previous imports with the Blosm addon. If unchecked, the previous imports will be ignored and the current import will be made relative to Blender's zero point.

Export and Custom Materials

Important note. It is strongly recommended to use the latest version of Blender (currently 3.6). There seemed to be a bug with the texture unpacking in the previous versions of Blender.

Materials applied to imported Google 3D Tiles can't be exported. You can automatically replace those materials with export-ready ones. Select Blender objects in question with Google 3D Tiles. The section Tools appears at the bottom of the Google 3D Tiles panel. Simply press the button Replace Materials to get export-ready materials for the selected objects.

Two additional steps are required for an export. First, save you Blender file with the imported Google 3D Tiles. Second, unpack all texture images: Main menu -> File -> External Data -> Unpack Resources. In the popup-window select Use files in current directory (create when necessary):

The texture images will be written to the folder textures next to your Blender file. Finally, perform an export to a file next to your Blender file.

It is also possible to replace materials in the selected objects with custom ones. Select the option custom in the Tools panel, select your custom material in the Material field and press the button Replace Materials.

Your custom material should have an Image Texture node with the label BASE COLOR (case-sensitive!). In that case the image texture from the original material will be set to that Image Texture node in your custom material.

FAQ

Q: I am getting the error Unable to process the root URI of the 3D Tiles: HTTP Error 403: Forbidden. How to fix it?
A: Most likely you forgot to enable the Maps Tiles API as described here.

Q: I am getting the error Unable to process the root URI of the 3D Tiles: HTTP Error 404: Not Found. How to fix it?
A: That kind of error occurs if something is wrong with your billing account at Google Cloud (e.g. invalid bank card). Please verify that everything was entered correctly in your billing account. See also here and here.

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