Yeah, I'm 75 and not getting any younger. Can you refresh my memory, and link to some of those threads where
"we always say they were just put there by the manager of the aerial"? The threads I recall were all real airplanes that just happened to be photographed. I think it would be tough to take a series of photos on the East coast without capturing some planes inadvertently. I don't know what a "plane boss" or a "manager of the aerial" is. What are those? Sorry, not trying to be argumentative, I really don't understand what you're saying. Must be my "memory issues".
I studied art/design in 1971 where we learned measured perspective the old way, with t-squares and drawing boards (we didn't have computers). The size of an object at any given distance is just a matter of geometry, the renaissance artists figured this out and paintings became more realistic as a result.
Let's take an example, viewed from the side, (on a flat earth in a two-dimensional universe, to keep it simple
). The red rectangles are airplanes and the black line is the earth. One airplane is parked on the runway and the other is flying exactly above it. If we extend lines up, the flying plane takes the same amount of space as the parked plane, regardless of how high the plane is flying because the blue lines are parallel. This is an orthographic (straight line) view.
But now, let's consider an aerial photograph of the same thing, taken from another airplane (the green dot) flying above the others. In this case, we follow the light rays from the objects to the camera and it's completely different. The flying plane will appear much larger than the plane on the ground. This is a perspective view, where things get smaller based on their distance from the camera. It would be very difficult to know the real size of that plane by comparing it to objects on the ground. We would have some sense of how high it's flying though because it will be larger when it is higher (closer to the camera).
But here's the thing: a satellite photo (like Google maps uses) is not like the second example, it's actually very close to the first (orthographic) example because the satellite is so high compared to the plane. If you move the green dot 300 miles up, the sides of the triangle will be nearly parallel. The two planes should be almost the same size no matter how high one is flying. That's why I don't think you can estimate the height of the plane in this case.
The way I figured it was 500 feet or so, how could I determine those poles in the powerline unless I was that close? If you zoom out, you cannot see them.
I don't think that has anything to do with the size of the plane. The ability to see the powerline/poles is simply a function of the resolution of the imagery. When you zoom out, you decrease the resolution. Specifically, when you zoom all the way in, each pixel in the image represents one foot (zoom level 19). As you zoom out, each "click" doubles that. So, if you zoom to level 15 each pixel represents 16 feet and you won't be able to resolve something small like a power pole. Yet the plane will remain the same relative size when compared to objects on the ground, regardless of your zoom setting.
OK, that's about all I can remember, due to my "memory issues".
