[ViziCities](http://vizicities.com) is a 3D city and data visualisation platform, powered by WebGL. Its purpose is to change the way you look at cities and the data contained within them. It is the brainchild of [Robin Hawkes](http://twitter.com/robhawkes) and [Peter Smart](http://twitter.com/petewsmart) — [get in touch](#contact--community) if you'd like to discuss the project with them in more detail.
ViziCities aims to combine data visualisation with a 3D representation of a city to provide a better understanding what's going on. It's a powerful new way of looking at and understanding urban areas.
Aside from seeing a city in 3D, here are some of the others things you'll have the power to do:
* View public transport (eg. buses, trains, planes) [flowing around a city in realtime](https://vimeo.com/67869313)
* Use vehicles powered by artificial intelligence to [perform realistic traffic simulation](https://vimeo.com/66512057)
* Visualise [social data in realtime](https://vimeo.com/67872925)
* Overlay historic and static data (eg. census data) using traditional techniques (eg. heatmaps)
ViziCities is at an incredibly early stage right now, but it's usable if you know what you're doing. The following steps should get you up and running without too much trouble.
Visualising geographic features lies at the core of ViziCities. To make sure features render correctly you'll need to [use the correct data formats](https://github.com/robhawkes/vizicities/blob/master/DATA-FORMATTING.md).
The idea is that you'll eventually be able to easily use your own data and visualise any city in the world. Until then, [a built in example](https://github.com/robhawkes/vizicities/tree/master/examples) has been provided to give you a taster of what ViziCities can do.
ViziCities can't happen without your help. We need people to submit bugs, suggest features, share how they're using ViziCities, and contribute code to the project. Sound like you? [Check out exactly how to get involved](https://github.com/robhawkes/vizicities/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md).
Communicate with the ViziCities team via email ([hello@vizicities.com](mailto:hello@vizicities.com)) and Twitter ([@ViziCities](http://twitter.com/ViziCities)). All other discussion should happen in the [ViziCities Google Group](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/vizicities) or [relevant GitHub issues page](https://github.com/robhawkes/vizicities/issues).
Over the past year [we've been producing experiments](http://rawkes.com/articles/vizicities-dev-diary-2) to prove that ViziCities is possible. These experiments, while working, were not robust and never intended for release. The version of ViziCities you see here is a solid foundation based on the lessons learnt from the previous experiments. It will eventually catch up with those experiments in regards to features.
Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.
