Downtown JAX in 3D

[heights unknown]

Here are some good aerial shots of Jacksonville:



http://www.urban-photos.com/albums/66/Jacksonville_Florida

Wow Lunican; great aerials.  Our City has a cauldron of possibilities skyline-wise downtown; the infrastructure is there...just need more infill.  It's a shame we have beautiful buildings, both old and young, and most of them are sitting empty.

Heights Unknown

[heights unknown]

He is doing a great job; never viewed Jax in 3D. So does anyone know what the end result will be out of what he is already "groundlaying?"  Will there be trees, roads, more dynamic sky, etc.?

Heights Unknown

[simms3]

Very impressive project!

[stjr]

never viewed Jax in 3D.

Heights Unknown

Heights, its a different take, but Google Earth has the entire downtown Jax area from the Stadium to past Myrtle Avenue in 3D on its site.  Using the tilt and altitude buttons, you can "lower" yourself between buildings and look down streets and around corners.  Or, you can just "fly" like a bird over and around various buildings and structures.  You can even make and save your own video tours.   If you haven't already, download the free viewer and enjoy:  http://earth.google.com/

[BigHache]

It's proven itself to be a very time-consuming project, but I knew that going in.

I'm going for photo real in the end, to answer your questions Heights. These are just test progress renderings.

The project plan is actually two-phase: current and historic (c. 1926 is what I'm currently thinking). I'm already well into researching and gathering data for the historic phase, some of which will apply to the current models. I've been successful with obtaining copies of some construction drawings from the city, but it's a difficult task because I have to provide them with an address for the building I want and that's not as easy as it sounds. Some buildings were commonly addressed by the streets they intersected and not a street number, or I'm also finding (for corner buildings) they were addressed on the other street and not the one currently listed. Finding record of what that street number is has been research all in its own. I don't know how many records they'll be able to find for me but anything is more than nothing.

Not only for dimensional accuracy, but a big reason I'm interested in getting these drawings are they label material colors, which it's not possible to determine from b/w photos. The postcards I've been collecting are false colored so they're of minimal help.

Why am I doing this? I thought it would be fun and I wanted to do something big.