Arc2Earth

Arc2Earth has always had the ability to display map tiles from Microsoft, Yahoo and Ask.com [1] as a custom layer in your map. What is new in this beta release is the ability to directly embed the API from Microsoft and Google into ArcMap. You can drape your own data over the existing globes and then use this as an element on your Page Layout for exporting to either paper or digital copies. The process of draping your current map over the globes happens automatically and on a background thread, so its really intuitive to work with and doesn’t stall the main thread ArcMap uses for most of its own work [2]. As you change your Map contents in the TOC, the changes are reflected on the globes as well.
Update - I added a video here that shows this functionality in action

GeneralThe embedded functionality works by creating new Custom Views for ArcMap. You can access these views from ArcMap’s View menu or more commonly, from the small buttons that appear below the main map. You’ll notice a couple extra buttons beyond those to toggle the VE/GE views. The first synchronizes the view with your current map view and the second opens the Option page for the current view.

Overlay DataThere are a couple methods to overlay data on the embedded globes. The first is the automatic overlay of the active map data using background generated tiles. You can toggle its visibility and change the transparency manually but everything else is pretty much automatic. The second is to specify a KML, GeoRSS or VE Colleciton feed as an overlay. You can toggle their visibility and optionally have them load when ArcMap is started. Finally, you can overlay any tile layer that has been created for VE or GM.

Page LayoutWhile some user may just want to display their data on screen for analysis, most others will want to create a hard copy of the results, this is of course one of the main uses of ArcMap. To accomplish this, A2E creates new menu items under the Insert menu that are only enabled when you are on the Layout View. You can drop any number of VE view elements on the layout and then resize/reposition them as needed. As frame elements, you can also use ArcMap’s build-in features to display custom frames, backgrounds or shadows. When you export or print, the higher DPI value is used when drawing the views (see below). The 2D views will not benefit much from the higher DPI but the 3D views look incredible when printed in the higher resolution [3]

Samples

Here’s a sample using data compiled by A2E user Peter Black of Environmental Defense. It shows the storm surge risk associated with different categories of hurricanes in the NYC Metropolitan area. On his layout, I added a 3D view of the tip of Manhattan in addition to the 2D map that was originally present. Since the 3D view is a layout element, it can be dragged or sized to best fit the overall design of your layout. It could be the dominant element or just a simple map surround to add context to your display.

If you are a current Arc2Earth V2 user and want to try out this beta, please feel free to contact me using the link above. All V2 users with Pro or better will get this functionality for free when its out of beta. Also, we are a Gold Sponsor at the ESRI MUG in Philadelphia (Nov 27-29th) and I’ll be demoing this functionality live at the show. Please stop by the booth if you have any questions.
[1] – Google still does not allow anyone (commercial, educational or non-profit) to embed their map tiles directly into an application. I would hope they change this policy in the future and when/if they do, we will certainly turn this functionality back on for the Google tiles as well. Microsoft requires a license if you will be using thier data for commercial projects.
[2] – this works really well on multi-core machines, the background tile generation happens independently of the regular ArcMap drawing
[3] – The Google Earth page layout element is disabled in this beta
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