Scot Wilson Is Hoping To Put Newtown On The (Google Earth) Map

By Shannon Hicks

What would it take to put Newtown on the map?

If it is Google Earth, it will take a team of residents who learn how to use one of two programs and get to work within the next few weeks.

Google is hosting an international contest called Google Model Your Town Competition and a team from Newtown has not only already started forming, it was the first group to register in Connecticut, according to team leader Scot Wilson. Formed on December 31, he and his son Niles have named the team The Blue Moon Modelers in honor of the first New Year’s Eve blue moon since 1990.

Mr Wilson, the owner of Contagious Media and its on-site installation arm YippieIO, is very excited about the challenge, and is hoping more residents will join him and/or form a team of their own.

The Google Model Your Town Competition is a challenge for residents around the world to create 3D models of their town using SketchUp or Google Building Maker software. Getting started is easy, and the software tools that are needed are provided by Google free of charge.

The 3D models will be added to the already growing 3D collection within Google Earth, an Internet offering that allows users to go anywhere on Earth to view satellite imagery, maps, terrain, and 3D buildings, “from galaxies in outer space to the canyons of the ocean,” according to Google Earth’s online introduction.

Google Earth already offers tours of castles and palaces, cathedrals, art museums, major league baseball stadiums, and even buildings on the National Registry of Historic Places, among other locations.

Now Google is hoping to increase the visibility of everyday cities and towns, and Scot Wilson is hoping to lead his town to Google fame and a small fortune. Actually the small fortune will be a $10,000 prize from Google to the public school system of the town where the winning team is based.

The winning team will also receive a visit from a Google team, along with an event in the winners’ honor; a video profile of the winning team and their town, to be featured on YouTube; a virtual tour of the winning town that will be added to Google Earth; international publicity through blog posts, tweets and other media; and additional coverage through Google websites.

Google is looking for consistency and accuracy. The scale, location, and orientation of models must be as true to life as possible, yet models should be kept as simple as possible so that they load quickly in Google Earth.

Teams will need to “paint” their models with photographs of the actual buildings, using photo editing software that will create textures without trees, cars, people, or “other visual clutter,” according to notes provided by Google Earth.

Teams are being encouraged to create a sense of place by emphasizing things that make their town unique, to include plenty of text information about the buildings they model, and to model as much as possible “to provide a compelling 3D experience for online visitors,” again according to Google Earth.

The work has to be done quickly if it is going to be considered for the contest, however. The deadline for submissions is March 1.

Finalists will be picked by a team of Google SketchUp experts. From there, a winner will be decided by a public vote that will take place through Google’s website. The winning town will be announced by May 15, 2010.

As of this week, a look through Google Earth shows no 3D buildings have been modeled in Newtown. Mr Wilson is already working on that, however.

He began photographing and modeling C.H. Booth Library this past summer, and returned to Main Street this week to begin photographing Newtown General Store and The Matthew Curtiss House.

Learn The Software

Scot Wilson will be hosting a workshop this weekend at C.H. Booth Library on Saturday, January 9, from 2 to 4 pm.

Bring a laptop and camera if you can, and plan to meet Scot and learn all about this project. He will show participants how to use SketchUp software and hopes to take photos of the library building and begin modeling that during the course of Saturday’s free workshop.

“We need to have a team of at least five more people. This will be a tutorial to teach people how to use the software. It’s not hard, but there is this program to learn and we want to get lots of people involved,” said Mr Wilson, who plans to make his a hands-on workshop.

“We’ll probably go outside to take pictures of the library and begin modeling it right then,” he added.

Niles Wilson will also be presenting a working on the competition and the work that is needed to model buildings, later this month. A member of Booth Library’s Young Adult Council, Niles will host his own presentation Monday, January 25, when the YAC holds its next meeting from 3 to 5 pm in the library’s meeting room.

Young adults interested in learning about the competition are encouraged to contact YA Librarian Margaret Brown at 203-426-4533.

“Even thought it’s a competition, modeling Newtown — or anywhere — doesn’t have to end with the competition,” Mr Wilson said. “Google will continue to accept buildings for its map [long after the competition deadline].

“But it would be great to win, wouldn’t it?” he continued. “Ten grand for the school system would really be something.”