Puma

ADDON. Version 1.1.0. Released on 11-Aug-2023. Provides 3 components. Created by Esri RnD Center Zurich. Features 0 video tutorials.

Puma is a plugin for Rhino and Grasshopper. It provides a Rhino command and Grasshopper components which enable the execution of CityEngine rules within a Rhino scene. Therefore, a Rhino artist or designer does not have to leave their familiar Rhino environment anymore to make use of CityEngine’s procedural modeling power. Complicated export-import steps are no longer needed, which also means that the procedural models do not need to be “baked” anymore. The building or street models stay procedural during the entire design or planning workflow. Consequently, the user can change any attributes of the building or street models easily by connecting them to other Grasshopper components. Puma requires Rule Packages (RPK) as input, which are authored in CityEngine. An RPK includes assets and a CGA rule file which encodes an architectural style. Comprehensive RPK examples are available below and can be used “out-of-the-box” in Puma. More examples for CGA rule files can additionally be found in the CityEngine tutorials. Puma is well suited for managing the procedural generation of architectural 3D content in design and urban planning scenarios. However, Puma is restricted to the procedural generation of buildings and street detailing/furniture. Puma does not include the city layout and street network editing tools of CityEngine (i.e. the rich CityEngine toolset to design a city from scratch or based on geographic data is still needed).