Visualizing the Human Hand Using CityEngine
Every now and then a really unique and out-of-the-box idea comes our way that expands our conceptions about the possible applications of the ArcGIS platform. This was one of those ideas. Could GIS be used to map the human body? More specifically, could we use CityEngine to visualize the progress of physical therapy for our friend and Esri colleague Pat Dolan of the Solutions team? Pat was eager to try this out, and he provided a table of measurements taken by his physical therapist to track his ability to grip and extend his fingers over time. With the help of the CityEngine team, we developed a 3D model of a hand, and used CityEngine rules to apply Pat's hand measurements to the model. We thought it would be fun to show a train station in a city that would magically transform into a hand. Our hand model is not quite anatomically correct, but it has all the digits and they are moveable!
Click the image above to view a short video of this project. Pat and I showed this application, and others, at the 2017 Esri Health and Human Services GIS Conference in Redlands. Click here to view a video of that presentation.