Procedural City Generation • Hacker News Board

Re: Procedural City Generation

#11

Post by bronz » Mon, Feb 16, 2015, 2:02 AM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #8

I was discussing procedural city generation with a graphics person awhile back. One of the things we realized is that procedurally generated cities almost always feel "wrong" because real life cities generally have a mishmash of dozens of general architectural "styles" based on various quirks of history. One example: in Cincinnati Ohio, working class houses in certain neighborhoods have stained glass windows . It's u…

Where can I learn more about the forces underlying the topography of cities? I find the connection you described between house width and taxation to be fascinating.

Re: Procedural City Generation

#12

Post by JabavuAdams » Mon, Feb 16, 2015, 2:09 AM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #8

I was discussing procedural city generation with a graphics person awhile back. One of the things we realized is that procedurally generated cities almost always feel "wrong" because real life cities generally have a mishmash of dozens of general architectural "styles" based on various quirks of history. One example: in Cincinnati Ohio, working class houses in certain neighborhoods have stained glass windows . It's u…

That can be encoded.

Re: Procedural City Generation

#13

Post by drewda » Mon, Feb 16, 2015, 3:11 AM UTC

Or, if you'd like to buy this off-the-shelf, the second author of the cited paper went on to co-found a company called Procedural, which was bought by Esri (the geo-spatial tech giant). Their work is still available as the City Engine product: http://www.esri.com/software/cityengine

Re: Procedural City Generation

#14

Post by GuiA » Mon, Feb 16, 2015, 3:11 AM UTC

bronz wrote: post #11

stcredzero wrote: post #8

I was discussing procedural city generation with a graphics person awhile back. One of the things we realized is that procedurally generated cities almost always feel "wrong" because real life cities generally have a mishmash of dozens of general architectural "styles" based on various quirks of history. One example: in Cincinnati Ohio, working class houses in certain neighborhoods have stained glass windows . It's u…

Where can I learn more about the forces underlying the topography of cities? I find the connection you described between house width and taxation to be fascinating.

The Death And Life of Great American Cities might overlap with and be a good starting point for what you're looking for.

Re: Procedural City Generation

#15

Post by Animats » Mon, Feb 16, 2015, 4:18 AM UTC

There are lots of programs which generate a semi-plausible city map, perhaps filled with generic buildings. But so far nobody seem to be able to generate something that looks even vaguely convincing from street level.

It would be fun, and even useful, to have a procedural storefront generator. One that constructs storefront styles, signage styles, door styles, and window displays. Use images from a street view program to train a machine learning algorithm as to what various parts of cities look like. Don't just use existing storefront images; build them up in 3D from door, window, sign, and display components.

Re: Procedural City Generation

#16

Post by bronz » Mon, Feb 16, 2015, 4:35 AM UTC

GuiA wrote: post #14

bronz wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where can I learn more about the forces underlying the topography of cities? I find the connection you described between house width and taxation to be fascinating.

The Death And Life of Great American Cities might overlap with and be a good starting point for what you're looking for.

Thank you very much.

Re: Procedural City Generation

#17

Post by stcredzero » Mon, Feb 16, 2015, 5:09 AM UTC

JabavuAdams wrote: post #12

stcredzero wrote: post #8

I was discussing procedural city generation with a graphics person awhile back. One of the things we realized is that procedurally generated cities almost always feel "wrong" because real life cities generally have a mishmash of dozens of general architectural "styles" based on various quirks of history. One example: in Cincinnati Ohio, working class houses in certain neighborhoods have stained glass windows . It's u…

That can be encoded.

Of course. The trick is knowing about how these things work so that they can be encoded.

Re: Procedural City Generation

#18

Post by frik » Mon, Feb 16, 2015, 5:36 AM UTC

bronz wrote: post #11

stcredzero wrote: post #8

I was discussing procedural city generation with a graphics person awhile back. One of the things we realized is that procedurally generated cities almost always feel "wrong" because real life cities generally have a mishmash of dozens of general architectural "styles" based on various quirks of history. One example: in Cincinnati Ohio, working class houses in certain neighborhoods have stained glass windows . It's u…

Where can I learn more about the forces underlying the topography of cities? I find the connection you described between house width and taxation to be fascinating.

Skyscrapers in New York of different decades have a architecture based on the city building code (famous example Empire State Building).

Re: Procedural City Generation

#19

Post by frik » Mon, Feb 16, 2015, 5:43 AM UTC

mjn wrote: post #10

Relatedly, I found this survey of different methods for procedural city generation (template-based, agent-simulation-based, etc.) to be informative: http://www.citygen.net/files/images/Procedural_City_Generati...

Excerpt: Road networks are a key aspect of city character and identity. Road networks are difficult to generalize since they are an interwoven component of a complex system. When viewing road networks from a map or city plan a number of patterns can be observed. It is these patterns that are key for procedural generation as they encode the structure of the road network.

Roads and rivers are the hard part, placing buildings next to it based on templates is easier.

Re: Procedural City Generation

#20

Post by RobertKerans » Mon, Feb 16, 2015, 6:30 AM UTC

bronz wrote: post #11

stcredzero wrote: post #8

I was discussing procedural city generation with a graphics person awhile back. One of the things we realized is that procedurally generated cities almost always feel "wrong" because real life cities generally have a mishmash of dozens of general architectural "styles" based on various quirks of history. One example: in Cincinnati Ohio, working class houses in certain neighborhoods have stained glass windows . It's u…

Where can I learn more about the forces underlying the topography of cities? I find the connection you described between house width and taxation to be fascinating.

Cities in Evolution by Patrick Geddes has some overlap (it's quite ideological though). It's archived as well: https://archive.org/details/citiesinevolutio00gedduoft