Google Street View is great for getting the look and feel of a location, but sometimes you get a little more than you bargained for. That's precisely what artist Jon Rafman uncovered while scouring Google for unexpected views — going way beyond directions — for his project Nine Eyes of Google Street View.
Named for the nine pole-mounted cameras on Google's fleet of electric cars, the photos are screenshots of remarkable events captured by accident during Google's routine documentation.
After uncovering many surprising scenes, from a startled moose to a robbery in progress, Jon recognized that "with its supposedly neutral gaze, the Street View photography had a spontaneous quality unspoiled by the sensitivities or agendas of a human photographer."
• See more: 9-Eyes
100 DIY Ideas for the 3-Day Weekend
Danielle's Charming, Classic Walk-Up
Good Food to Share 
The Big Book of Small, Cool Spaces 
Apartment Therapy Presents 
The Eight-Step Home Cure 
White Enamel Flatwa...
How To Cook Fluffy, Tasty Quinoa
Perfect Summer Cocktail Recipe: Honey Bourbon Lemonade
Which image is the robbery in progress?
Moose? Reindeer.
That is a reindeer (aka caribou), not a moose shown above.
Oh my gosh that is too funny!
Some of the pictures are visually great! Who would have thought?
I presume number 7 is the "robbery in progress" picture. Actually at first glance I thought it was the "surprised lover escapes when husband arrives home unexpectedly" picture. Actually, I kinda still think that...
What the ish is up with the guy in the gas mask in the woods?
@SpikeLateen, so true, so true!
I agree with Stationeryfiend, #7 may well be a lover escaping before/as hubby arrives...he has no shirt on...I think most robbers are fully dressed.
You have to click the link to see all the photos. Well worth it! Who knew there were so many gross men and hookers in the world? :P I'd love to have it in book form. Some of the images are fascinating!
That dog squeezing through the gate looks stuck. I hope the photographer stepped in to help.
Um, what's strange about num 6?
I went through the photos until I couldn't stand how sad they made me feel. While there are images of great beauty, there is much more ugliness, violence, blight, animal abuse. I do not feel better about the world having viewed these shots.
@ rural and rueful...the 'photographer is a tiny camera mounted on a vehicle with a driver. I'm pretty sure no one even sees the images until days later.
These images are fantastic. Kudos to the artist for editing and collecting.
@clickchick, yes, I know I have seen the Google vehicles and bikes doing their thing. But that vehicle had a driver, who was driving pretty slow, and the driver would have seen the dog. I hate to think anyone would pass by and leave a stuck dog in the sun. It pains me to think they probably did.
Ditto the baby crawling toward the road from the Gucci shop (image on the Website). I hope the child was found in time.
If you type in my parents' address you can see my dad half out from underneath his car in the driveway, changing the oil. :)
@clickchick - Where did you get that data - "...sex trafficking 11-14 year old girls in America is happening in the hundreds of thousands..."?
@ellabee
It's hard to believe but it's the truth, there's thousands of young girls involved in prostitution here in the US, check out the documentary "Very Young Girls." Also, for more info check out Children of the Night's website, a non profit helping these young girls.
http://www.tumblr.com/photo/1280/9eyes/605107024/1/tumblr_l2jcvu1Zth1qzun8o
Flash back to Hitchcock' "Birds" in 3... 2... 1...
These images are incredible . Some of them are shocking-like the woman being carried against her will (it appears) into a car..Who is she? What is happening to her? Is it a rape or a rescue? That's what these images do for me..Make me wonder about what's going on.
There's something about the anonymity of the whole thing that makes them compelling. It's not great art, it's not art at all, I think that's the point. None the less I couldn't stop scrolling until I got to the end.
The Google street views in our neighborhood showed a group of teenage boys attempting to break into a panel truck. They were climbing all over it. Crazy.
@Clickchick, why turn this into hostility against me? Haw dare you! I am not "blissfully" unaware. You know nothing about me. I am able to feel compassion. Too bad you can't.
Your post is inappropriate for AT.
These are so fascinating. Thanks, AT.
God, the comments on AT are really, really lame sometimes.
Thanks for the post, Jennifer! I enjoyed it, at least :)
@clickchick You have no right to invalidate Rural's feelings regarding her reaction to pictures depicting suffering. Her feelings are valid and likely drive action that lead to changing situations for the better. To accuse her of blissful ignorance and proceed to lay out your alleged history as a reporter and consequent superiority by virtue of the fact that you have been desensitized to images that lead Rural to suffer is a bully tactic designed to silence her while elevating yourself. Being affected by these images of suffering is evidence to an awareness of the world that Rural perceives yet YOU are blinded to through some sense of callous superiority. Your bringing in sex trafficking is a strawman argument, completely off point and points to the weakness of your position.
These are amazing, and some look like vintage vernacular photos ~ only without the photographer.
I like to hope that the driver did stop and rescue the dog at some point after that image was recorded.
How does someone go through so many images of the entire world and find these?!
I don't understand how people find these on Google Street view unless they are spending hours and hours doing nothing else. I had a similar idea (if you are at all visually inclined I think you can't help it), but I just did not have the patience to pore over the views to the extent it would have taken--why he made art out of it and I couldn't!
i hate it when people see violence, robberies, (child) prostitution, very sad parenting fails, deadly car crashes etc. and start lamenting about a dog.
oh yeah, dear commenters, kill me for this, but this is my opinion. i like dogs. but as a human, I feel more concerned about the humans in those pics.
Most of the images weren't that bad, IMO. Of course the the prostitution, poverty, etc. are bad, but I wouldn't say it's the focus of the blog. There are a lot of images of beauty. I guess for some people, the bad overtakes the more benign images, but that's normal. It's like the news; bad news draws the crowds.
I apologize that my gut reaction to what I perceived as blissful ignorance was stated so poorly. I just found it so shocking that there are people who don't know how rough the world is on many people. (It's why I can't watch law/cop programs any more. It's hard for me to find rape and murder entertaining when someone you love was raped and murdered.) <i/>
And, for example when I shared some stats on FB about teenage sex trafficking in America and Cambodia - a friend of my brother's responded with shock in a way that evidenced that this was a brand new concept to her, like she didn't know there were people that sick out there -- and that is just ignorant to me. (I mean, read something occasionally, learn something.)
@ Ellabee who asked about data regarding my comment about sex trafficking:
"The total number of sex trafficking victims is a difficult number to determine. Some 100,000-plus children are at risk, meaning they are susceptible to being enticed and victimized. Additionally, the figure is difficult to ascertain given the fear, threats and victim’s inability to ask for help due to emotional and physical abuse. Commercial sexual exploitation is an underground, secretive business that is often on the move. "
http://www.theicosamagazine.com/in-america-really-human
also
http://truckersagainsttrafficking.org/human-trafficking-issues just for a start
Sorry, if this isn't a pleasant topic for a design blog. But it seems like there are some smart people here - and we all need to know what is going on in the world, because how else can we make change?
@hrhprincessfiona I'm glad I'm not the only one concerned about the tiger. I think I gave that picture a quadruple-take before finally continuing on.