Re: [Houdini] How to drive a parameter with a texture/weight map?

[Andy Goehler]

Hi Thomas,

in Houdini this is handled by attributes on the geometry. You can create these 
attributes in different ways, by painting, transfer or even textures.

This thread has an example scene that should help you:
http://forums.odforce.net/topic/13744-per-point-physical-attributes-eg-friction/
 


Have fun
Andy



> On 09.05.2017, at 11:26, Thomas Volkmann  wrote:
> 
> Hi,
>  
> I'm getting my feet wet with Houdini (first task: fluid hitting a surface). 
> It feels nice actually, but the sheer amount of 
> documentation/tutorials/starterguides is quite overwhelming and with a 
> slightly different terminology it's not so easy to >quickly< find answers to 
> rather basic questions.
>  
> So, as the title says: How to drive a parameter with a texture/weight map?
>  
> A simple Softimage example: A push operator where you drive the push amount 
> with a weight map.
> Or in ICE you get a textureValue at location or you can use some turbulence.
>  
> Basically I want to modify the bounce value on my collider with a bit of 
> noise for now.
>  
>  
> Thanks for the help, and sorry for being Off-Topic...
>  
> cheers,
> Thomas
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Re: shameful houdini question

[Andy Goehler]

Hi Steven,

same as Andy (Nicholas) here, VOPs mostly for Noise stuff, Wrangles for 
anything else.

Cheers and have fun.
Andy

> On Apr 27, 2017, at 12:47 AM, Steven Caron  wrote:
> 
> Just to understand how the power users are using this. Are you using wrangle 
> nodes with vex snippets 100% of the time or are you using the VOP sub graph 
> for somethings?

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Re: Anybody finding the Houdini example files I've posted useful?

[Andy Goehler]

I don’t think so. As Jonathan mentioned already, conditionals and flow control 
is often easier to ‘read’ in text form than it is in a node graph.

Every tool has its place, so does code in text form :D

Happy weekend.
Andy

> On Apr 14, 2017, at 3:18 AM, Jason S  wrote:
> 
> Shouldn't we be way past describing effects in text editors by now?

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Re: Houdini Digital Assets for Softies

[Andy Goehler]

In honor of inspiration how about?

• softLib
• siLib
• ICELib


> On Mar 29, 2017, at 6:08 PM, Andy Nicholas  wrote:
> 
> Continuing the thread here:
> 
> Any suggestions for a name?
> A
> 
> On 29/03/2017 17:00, Andy Nicholas wrote:
>> I'm more than happy to help. I'm just unsure how much time I'll be 
>> able to devote to this as I'm pretty busy with some personal work at 
>> the moment.
>> 
>> How about I set up something similar to Nick's on Github and we go 
>> from there?
>> 
>> We need a name for it. Let's start a new thread on the list and move 
>> discussions over to that. Is that okay?
>> 
>> A
> 
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Re: Random Thoughts about H.

[Andy Goehler]

Very well put about the ICE ‘macros’.

Not to forget to mention that until such ‘factory’ nodes are provided, there’s 
always the option to do it yourself and save it as an asset (HDA).

Andy

> On Mar 28, 2017, at 4:49 PM, Jonathan Moore  wrote:
> 
> I think the thing that can cause frustration when applying an ICE mindset to 
> Houdini is that ICE had quite a few macro helpers even when working at a 
> micro level. VEX and VOP functions in Houdini by comparison are often far 
> more granular. That means that functionality provided by a single node in XSI 
> often requires multiple nodes/functions in Houdini. I’m hoping that VOPs is 
> further developed to include a library of ‘Compound’ like macros. If there’s 
> any area’s where former XSI artists could help the SideFX developers improve 
> Houdini, this seems like a winner to me. <>
>  
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Re: Random Thoughts about H.

[Andy Goehler]

Good morning,

this is the awesome support at SideFX

Available in the daily builds.
yesterday
Houdini 16.0.561 Added a hotkey to temporary toggle the state of the "Allow
Dropping Nodes on Wires" preference while in the middle of dragging a node.


On Mon, 27 Mar 2017 at 12:22, Andy Nicholas  wrote:

> No problem Jonathan.
>
> A quick update to this following discussions with SideFX:
>
> 1) I don't recall if this was mentioned in the thread earlier, but they
> mentioned that you can enable/disable the auto-connect on wires using
> CTRL+8 or in the Network View menu under Tools-> Allow Dropping Nodes on
> Wires. This doesn't work during a drag operation though, so I've gone back
> and explained the desired workflow of having a modifier key to toggle the
> behaviour during the dragging of nodes. I just thought I'd post this in
> here now case it's useful to anyone in the mean time.
>
> 2) They pointed out that I was incorrect when I said earlier in this
> thread there wasn't an equivalent view of Softimage's Explorer view where
> you can see clean hierarchies of objects. You can do it in the Tree View.
> You just need to enable the Object Filter (the first button in the Tree
> View's tool bar). You can also right click on the Tree View toolbar, and
> there are various other options in there which can be helpful for sorting
> and grouping the objects in a tree structure. Definitely worth playing with
> anyway. Sorry for the misinformation before!
>
> Cheers,
> A
>
>
> On 26/03/2017 13:55, Jonathan Moore wrote:
>
> Thanks Andy.
>
>
>
> *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [
> mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
> ] *On Behalf Of *Andy Nicholas
> *Sent:* 26 March 2017 00:37
> *To:* Official Softimage Users Mailing List.
> https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/xsi_list
>  
> *Subject:* Re: Random Thoughts about H.
>
>
>
> I also like Pauls idea of a modifier key to disable the auto connection on
> demand. Definitely seems a worthwhile enhancement request.
>
>
>
> FYI, I’ve submitted an RFE to Side Effects and sent them the link to this
> thread.
>
>
>
> A
>
>
>
>
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Re: Random Thoughts about H.

[Andy Goehler]

The new for H16 automatic and manual options to organize/align networks should 
help in this regard.

> On 24.03.2017, at 14:04, <p...@bustykelp.com> <p...@bustykelp.com> wrote:
> 
> I understand that when it works as planned its a good feature and it would be 
> really useful if I could control when it does and when it doesn’t happen. (by 
> holding a key down for example)
>  
> In ICE, it works fine because it happens when you place a new node. NOT when 
> you re-organise the tree. But in Houdini, it happens just when you move nodes 
> a bit.  So I  have the choice of either having my nodes spread apart SO far 
> that they are tiny and I can’t read them, but the risk is reduced a bit. Or 
> having them naturally close, but constantly auto connecting and messsing up 
> my work.
>  
> From: Simon Reeves <mailto:si...@simonreeves.com>
> Sent: Friday, March 24, 2017 12:04 PM
> To: Official Softimage Users Mailing 
> List.https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/xsi_list 
> <mailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com>
> Subject: Re: Random Thoughts about H.
>  
> I feel like if you disabled 'auto connecting dropping nodes onto wires'  youd 
> disable a really useful feature, can you not just be more careful ;) 
> and regards to copy + paste, alt+drag to copy is very useful because you can 
> place them
>  
> On Fri, 24 Mar 2017 at 11:46 Jonathan Moore <jonathan.moo...@gmail.com 
> <mailto:jonathan.moo...@gmail.com>> wrote:
>> The improvements to the network editor in Houdini 16 is probably my 
>> favourite aspect of the release. It answers many of the complaints you 
>> mention Oliver.
>>  <> 
>>  
>> From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
>> <mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com> 
>> [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
>> <mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com>] On Behalf Of Olivier 
>> Jeannel
>> Sent: 24 March 2017 09:46
>> To: Official Softimage Users Mailing List. 
>> https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/xsi_list 
>> <https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/xsi_list> 
>> <softimage@listproc.autodesk.com <mailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com>>
>> 
>> Subject: Re: Random Thoughts about H.
>> 
>>  
>> Getting back to the subject of organisation, I still consider myself as a 
>> houdini beginner.
>> The thing is, it so open that you quickly import the ice science into vop 
>> and you get comfident enough quickly.
>> My experience is with the 15.5, and probably not the latest release.
>> I found the stiky notes not that handy ( clicking on it sometimes close it, 
>> or it gets in the way), naming a node or an area. was a pain, you enter the 
>> name hit "enter" and it bounces back to its previous name. Having to retype 
>> 3 or 4 times until it catches it correctly.
>> The surrounding colored area that you can draw around your network were 
>> buggy as well. Once the network surrounded it was mostly unworkable...
>> So finally I just relied on colored nodes...
>> I also found the node editor to be a bit buggy when working with a high 
>> number of nodes. It can get slow, and the mouse pointer was clicking in an 
>> unprecize manner (when trying to pick the line between 2 nodes), sometimes 
>> creating disaster.
>> And by high number of nodes i mean : my final scene was having one big 
>> obj/geo node for the animation, containing a dozen of complete big sop trees 
>> (with for each, vop, and a few dops, some cachefiles..).
>> I found that working within one single big node was better than having to 
>> jump back and forth into exterior nodes.
>> But the downside is that I had to navigate (swim) in that huge forest of 
>> slow undocumented trees.
>>  
>> Seems they fixed all this naming, note and coloring in the 16. If someone 
>> can confirm. 
>> 
>> On Thursday, March 23, 2017, Andy Goehler <lists.andy.goeh...@gmail.com 
>> <mailto:lists.andy.goeh...@gmail.com>> wrote:
>>> Regarding Passes, at first it felt really strange, everything seemed 
>>> different. But after some time and getting into bundles the basics were 
>>> mastered. What always bugged me in Softimage was managing partitions across 
>>> passes. If there were changes you’d be hunting down all the partitions in 
>>> various passes. I’ve always wished for something expression based. With 
>>> wildcards on ROPs and smart bundles this opened the doors of freedom. I 
>>> never worry about that anymore.
>>>  
>>> For overrides I use object merges, as Jordi mentioned. This is

Re: Random Thoughts about H.

[Andy Goehler]

> 
> On 24.03.2017, at 10:45, Olivier Jeannel  wrote:
> 
> Seems they fixed all this naming, note and coloring in the 16. If someone can 
> confirm. 

Yes, the pre H16 node editor annoyances were mostly addressed in H16. Also, 
navigating large SOP networks, or networks in generell is made much easier by 
using quickmarks. And don’t forget the birds eye overview.

One of our Softimage look devs hated the fact, that you had to click first then 
connect with nodes. This was also addressed in H16 in which you can now click 
and drag to connect nodes.

Some of these worklfow issues seem so obvious that it’s easily aggravating that 
they are absent. However, if you look into the lifetime of a product it becomes 
clear that focus was somewhere else. But recent releases have shown that SESI 
tries to do better in these areas as well.

I’ve praised SESI support so many times in the past and it’s repeated 
throughout the Houdini community. Take a minute or two and write down a 
worklfow or feature request and file it with support. Each Houdini release 
resembles a lot of these requests.

DOP, SOP, Hooray :D

Andy



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Re: Houdini Discord server

[Andy Goehler]

I second that, it might be a bit more overwhelming trying to keep up, but
it's an awesome additional resource.

Andy

On Thu, 23 Mar 2017 at 17:37, Jonathan Moore 
wrote:

> Hi folks,
>
>
>
> Thought I’d give another mention to the Houdini Discord server as this
> becoming a very cool resource.
>
>
>
> https://thinkprocedural.github.io/
>
>
>
> I’ve spotted Jordi & Tim in the channels over the last few days getting
> answers from the assembled Go Procedural ninja’s.
>
>
>
> It’s a fantastically generous and open community, post a question (and a
> HIP if you like) and before long you’ll get two or three HIP’s back with
> suggested paths forward.
>
>
>
> Only downside is that you realise how much more you have to learn! 
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Re: Random Thoughts about H.

[Andy Goehler]

Regarding Passes, at first it felt really strange, everything seemed different. 
But after some time and getting into bundles the basics were mastered. What 
always bugged me in Softimage was managing partitions across passes. If there 
were changes you’d be hunting down all the partitions in various passes. I’ve 
always wished for something expression based. With wildcards on ROPs and smart 
bundles this opened the doors of freedom. I never worry about that anymore.

For overrides I use object merges, as Jordi mentioned. This is not ideal, but 
manageable, not to mention extremely flexible and always reflects changes. I’ve 
looked into material style sheets and they are quite powerful, but not as nice 
to manage from a UI perspective. I found I’d rather manage additional objects 
with object merges and their material assignments, etc. Nevertheless, MSS can 
get the job done.

What I’d wish for is a graph similar to Katana, where nodes collect the objects 
and lights. Additional nodes provide material assignment and overrides. Or 
simply bundles with overrides :D

I’m still putting the pieces together to file an RFE with SESI.

Andy



> On 23.03.2017, at 14:11, Andy Nicholas  wrote:
> 
> Yep. Worth mentioning the Material SOP too where you can override on a per 
> point/primitive/global level if you need to.
> 
> It was also pointed out to me the other day that the Material SOP is capable 
> of generating material stylesheets for you. I'm still getting my head around 
> that particular functionality, but I can see it has the potential to be very 
> helpful in a more automated pipeline.
> 
> A
> 
> 
> 
> On 23/03/2017 12:36, Jordi Bares wrote:
>> Indeed, no matter which software we choose we will certainly miss Softimage 
>> overrides and passes… Houdini offers a few approaches but none of them is as 
>> smooth and easy as Softimage.
>> 
>> The best route I have round is to use Object_Merges to do the overrides but 
>> indeed it is not as nice… :-P
>> 
>> BTW, check Material Style Sheets… will open some new avenues that may be 
>> useful.
>> 
>> jb
>> 
>> 
>>> On 23 Mar 2017, at 08:50, Rob Wuijster >> > wrote:
>>> 
>>> @Jordi and others:
>>> 
>>> Besides all the new stuff to learn, where - as you said - some stuff is 
>>> easier than others (VEX), my main gripe is rendering.
>>> I still try to get some workflow running where I can easily create 
>>> Passes/Partitions/overrides like I did in Softimage.
>>> 
>>> I know it's not the same thing in H, but not being able to quickly override 
>>> shaders on top scene level, or in bundles is a huge miss.
>>> It often results in multiple shaders and switches.
>>> 
>>> There's also Takes, but from what I've read on it most people stay clear 
>>> from it. And there's material stylesheets which are a tad over-designed and 
>>> not really user friendly imho.
>>> 
>>> So any workflows people developed on rendering, after starting to use 
>>> Houdini, are very much welcome.
>>> 
>>> cheers!
>>> 
>>> Rob
>>> 
>>> \/-\/\/
>>> On 22-3-2017 11:36, Jordi Bares wrote:
 
> Yet for the points mentioned, I would have an easier time agreeing with 
> you if indeed I found "some things to be easier, and others not", whereas 
> beyond what could be associated to "XSI muscle memory",  the sheer 
> quantity or proportions of things that are not not just easier, but 
> considerably much (much!) easier, makes it hard to just overlook and just 
> "go with it", especially when knowing how things can be.
 Putting aside the fact we have to move out of Softimage sooner or later 
 (hardware, OS, drivers, freelancers, support, etc… will eventually force 
 us out)
 
 Putting aside those areas Sofimage can’t compete because it does not have 
 the functionality (heavy duty FX mostly, Terrains, Game integration, etc…)
 
 I would like to focus on those day to day scenarios you feel are not easy 
 in Houdini, after all we could submit this input to Side Effects.
 
 Is there any particular scenario you feel strongly Softimage is much more 
 comfortable/easy/convenient?
 
 :-)
 
 jb
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 subject, and reply to confirm.
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>> 
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Re: Random Thoughts about H.

[Andy Goehler]

Yes, we’ve used Exocortex Crate to successfully get Strands into Houdini. I 
think it also works with the onboard Alembic exporter, not sure though.

Have fun
Andy

> On Mar 22, 2017, at 3:52 PM, p...@bustykelp.com wrote:
> 
> Hi.. Seeing as this thread is Random thoughts about Houdini, this is pretty 
> random..
>  
> Does anyone know if its possible ( maybe through Alembic, which can store 
> them) , to get ICE Strands into Houdini?
>  
> From: Andy Goehler <mailto:lists.andy.goeh...@gmail.com>
> Sent: Wednesday, March 22, 2017 2:17 PM
> To: Official Softimage Users Mailing 
> List.https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/xsi_list 
> <mailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com>
> Subject: Re: Random Thoughts about H.
>  
> Funny how that is. I find it the other way around, especially opening 
> differently organized scenes coming from Softimage co-workers :D
> Honestly I don’t organize my Houdini scenes any more than I did in Softimage. 
> But the network editor allows me to work spatially instead of using the 
> explorer in a list or hierarchical fashion and that just suits me sooo much 
> better, since the schematic in Soft is… well old.
>  
> I guess the different levels of context and therefore a compartmentalization 
> of workflow is what Softimage users tend to struggle with, maybe this is what 
> you mean by organisation?
>  
> Have fun
> Andy
>  
>> On 22.03.2017, at 13:50, Olivier Jeannel <facialdel...@gmail.com 
>> <mailto:facialdel...@gmail.com>> wrote:
>>  
>> Houdini requires a high level of organisation, and that's by far, to me, the 
>> hardest part.
> 
>  
> 
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Re: Random Thoughts about H.

[Andy Goehler]

Funny how that is. I find it the other way around, especially opening 
differently organized scenes coming from Softimage co-workers :D
Honestly I don’t organize my Houdini scenes any more than I did in Softimage. 
But the network editor allows me to work spatially instead of using the 
explorer in a list or hierarchical fashion and that just suits me sooo much 
better, since the schematic in Soft is… well old.

I guess the different levels of context and therefore a compartmentalization of 
workflow is what Softimage users tend to struggle with, maybe this is what you 
mean by organisation?

Have fun
Andy

> On 22.03.2017, at 13:50, Olivier Jeannel  wrote:
> 
> Houdini requires a high level of organisation, and that's by far, to me, the 
> hardest part.

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Re: When you are a higly depressed suicidal graphic designer

[Andy Goehler]

Wasn’t that debunked in CG Garage #93 as not really being used? Sorry, I may 
remember that incorrectly.

https://labs.chaosgroup.com/index.php/cg-garage-podcast/cg-garage-podcast-93-steve-spaz-williams-and-mark-dippe/
 


> On Mar 16, 2017, at 10:15 PM, Sven Constable  wrote:
> 
> The combination of classical stop motion artists using a physical prop to 
> steer 3D animation led to some very convincing digital animatio

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Re: New H16 Smoothing node

[Andy Goehler]

IIRC, the new Smooth 2.0 and Attribute Blur SOPs even use OpenCL. So they 
compute on the GPU.

Andy

> On Feb 28, 2017, at 5:54 PM, Jonathan Moore  wrote:
> 
> but then I discover Houdini ships with a C++ compiled Smoothing node that's 
> even faster! 

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Re: Soft to Houdini custom shelf / scripts.

[Andy Goehler]

The beauty is, there is no need to write such a button. The workflow provides 
this functionality in form of nodes. You  just add ‘export’ / ‘import’ nodes. 
You can also consolidate/merge these exports into a single one to execute them 
all at once/sequentially.

You setup once and not worry about it ever again during your project. And you 
don’t have to keep track of that script button afterwards :D

Andy


> On Feb 22, 2017, at 4:08 AM, Jason S  wrote:
> 
> Also is there a command log to easily script things such as in this case,  an 
> export/import button?

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Re: Opinion gathering

[Andy Goehler]

> On 21.02.2017, at 14:26, Felix Geremus  wrote:
> 
> For me the most exciting sentence in the whole H16 presentation was "we will 
> talk about big time lighting next year". Can't wait to see what they will 
> come up with...

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Re: Opinion gathering

[Andy Goehler]

Hey Felix,

regardless of the numbers of licenses bring up your issues with them. Even back 
when we were on one license stuff got implemented. I know I sound like a broken 
record when saying that SideFX support is not something most of us had 
experienced before with a software vendor of that size.

Regarding what Jordi said, H16 does have improvements with viewport handling, 
although they may not be what you'd like them to be :)

Have fun and hang in there.
Andy





> On 21.02.2017, at 12:14, Felix Geremus  wrote:
> 
> I will try. But honestly, given your background and mine (and the number of 
> licenses involved) I don't have very high expectations of being heard very 
> soon. Also I think it will be hard for them to make such fundamental changes 
> like completely revamping hotkey behavior, without pissing off their 
> established user base, no matter how reasonable the changes might be. But 
> let's see, maybe I will be surprised.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 2017-02-21 12:04 GMT+01:00 Jordi Bares  >:
> Do it please, these things are hard to explain and Softimage is so well fine 
> tuned in this respect I believe there is lot to learn from it. Make sure you 
> do that because they are in a huge drive to usability in the viewport.
> 
> They have improved it a lot in H16 but I am sure there is more to do.. Then 
> of course is the factor of being used to and you, l like me, will get used to 
> the idiosyncrasies but it is a this moment that you are not 100% comfortable 
> that is the most valuable.
> 
> Cheers
> jb
> 
>> On 21 Feb 2017, at 10:45, Felix Geremus > > wrote:
>> 
>> Hey Tim, I know the Entagma Video (and all the others, amazing tutorials). 
>> It helps a little bit. But I think it's funny that even during the tutorial 
>> he frequently runs into similar problems I'm experiencing. Like the near 
>> clipping plane constantly broken, having to reset the view because something 
>> is off, difficulties to select stuff
>> 
>> Jordi, I will try to send my issues to SideFX as soon as I have some time.
>> 
>> I think the main problem is a completely awkward combination of shortcuts 
>> behaving differently when different tools are active and even worse when my 
>> cursor is in different parts of the layout. For example the nasty Esc key 
>> puts me into view mode. Now in view mode the 1,2,3,4 keys change my current 
>> view, while in select mode I switch between components. When I'm hovering 
>> the network view 1 shows/hides the selected node. 
>> Or I really like the Y key to Ghost or Hide other Objects. But the shortcut 
>> only works while I'm in view mode, in select mode or while hovering the 
>> network view nothing happens, in edit mode though it toggles through my 
>> transform gizmos. This is madness! A shortcut should bring me into the 
>> desired mode (select, edit, view) not require me hit another shortcut in 
>> advance to behave the way I want it. Ok I'll end it here :)
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 2017-02-21 0:30 GMT+01:00 Tim Bolland > >:
>> Hey Felix, I know what you mean and I still have some reservations about it 
>> as a pure get-things-done-dirty moddler and scene assembler. Although I'm 
>> hoping I just need to learn more to get comfortable with it. 
>> 
>> However this video might help a bit wth selections and the scene model.
>> 
>> http://www.entagma.com/select-and-navigate/ 
>> 
>> 
>> Cheers,
>> 
>> Tim. 
>> From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
>>  
>> > > on behalf of Felix Geremus 
>> >
>> Sent: 20 February 2017 23:04:40
>> To: Official Softimage Users Mailing List. 
>> https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/xsi_list 
>> 
>> Subject: Re: Opinion gathering
>>  
>> I am on the Houdini train for a couple of months now. And I really like it 
>> for the most part, especially the more technical aspects are incredible and 
>> way better than Softimage ever was. But I am still confused by all the 
>> praise for Houdini in certain areas like poly modeling or scene assembly. 
>> I'm still learning (and I'm on my own) so there is a high chance that I 
>> might do something wrong. But as an example I think the selection and 
>> interaction model is a complete mess. Quickly selecting and modifying 
>> geometry, like in Soft or even Maya is still almost impossible, at least for 
>> me. I can't see anybody doing some serious modeling inside this tool. H16 
>> seems to be a step in the right direction, but especially for those "get it 
>> done as quick and dirty as possible" type of jobs, I 

Re: Soft to Houdini custom shelf / scripts.

[Andy Goehler]

Be advised, this will increase your file size. A lock on a node is essentially 
caching at that node.
If you must, I’d advised to collapse to subnets.

Andy


> On Feb 20, 2017, at 10:30 PM, Olivier Jeannel  wrote:
> 
> Ctrl click on the red (left side of the node (not the yellow) ) This will 
> lock the node like a "freeze". Everything above is computed and "locked".
> 
> 2017-02-20 22:19 GMT+01:00 Paulo Cesar Duarte  >:
> Hey Pierre and Ed... 
> I'm starting with Houdini too, just studying SOP for now.
> There is a simple way to freeze modeling like XSI? Without the need of 
> caching geometry, just freezing or collapse?
> 
> Cheers.
> 
> 2017-02-10 19:48 GMT-02:00 Jordi Bares  >:
> A few thoughts of mine.. hope you don’t mind poking at those suggestions…
> 
>> On 3 Feb 2017, at 20:11, Ed Schiffer > > wrote:
>> hi Tim
>> I am just starting in Houdini as well and would be interested in a XSI Shelf 
>> tools.
> 
> Good idea
> 
>> for these particular issues you mentioned, you could match the Translate, 
>> Rotate, Scale and or Pivot using the icons on the right of these parameters. 
>> very useful!
> 
> You have matching of transformations but may be I could put together a few 
> Softimage friendly ones too…
> 
>> and on the Modify shelft tab you have the Center Pivot button as well.
> 
> You may not want that, I rather suggest you install qLib and you will have a 
> bunch of presets installed on normal translation nodes that allow you to do 
> the centroid quickly, also placing in the center of the world, on the floor, 
> etc...
> 
>> also, under the Pre-Transform dropdown at the top of the Transforms tab, you 
>> have Clean Transforms/Translate/Rotate/Scale with for my understanding are 
>> basic as the Freeze in XSI. when you Extract these you get your global 
>> transforms and when you Reset them you'd be setting the Pre-Transforms back 
>> to zero…
> 
> The pretransforms are like XSI neutral pose
> 
> Regarding Freeze… that is one of the things you may not want to inherit in 
> Houdini. Although at first made sense to me once I got a bit more under the 
> bonnet it was obvious that you can do it without having to rely on freezing. 
> Either by saving to disk, storing the resulting network on the scene or other 
> means.
>> 
>> hope that makes sense, I thought it to be very straightforward. Houdini is 
>> very rewarding to learn, hope you enjoy.
> 
> :-)
> jb
> 
>> 
>> cheers
>> 
>> On 3 February 2017 at 15:12, Tim Bolland > > wrote:
>> Hey, I'm currently taking a good look at Houdini as an application moving 
>> forward and I'm wondering if anyone has or uses any custom scripts to mimic 
>> some of the more used functions of Softimage. I'm thinking of things such as 
>> "Match All Transforms" and "Move Center to Vertices". General workflow 
>> commands you realise you miss when you jump into new software, I can imagine 
>> a script savvy guy out there must have whipped up custom shelf as soon as 
>> the program opened . Any information would be hugely 
>> appreciated. 
>> 
>> Cheers,
>> 
>> 
>> Tim
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Softimage Mailing List.
>> To unsubscribe, send a mail to softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com 
>>  with "unsubscribe" in the 
>> subject, and reply to confirm.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> -- 
>> www.edschiffer.com --
>> Softimage Mailing List.
>> To unsubscribe, send a mail to softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com 
>>  with "unsubscribe" in the 
>> subject, and reply to confirm.
> 
> 
> --
> Softimage Mailing List.
> To unsubscribe, send a mail to softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com 
>  with "unsubscribe" in the 
> subject, and reply to confirm.
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> paulo-duarte.com 
> --
> Softimage Mailing List.
> To unsubscribe, send a mail to softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com 
>  with "unsubscribe" in the 
> subject, and reply to confirm.
> 
> --
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> To unsubscribe, send a mail to softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com with 
> "unsubscribe" in the subject, and reply to confirm.

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Softimage Mailing List.
To unsubscribe, send a mail to softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com with 
"unsubscribe" in the subject, and reply to confirm.

Re: Maya

[Andy Goehler]

The moment it ‘clicks’ in your head about the Houdini way you don’t want to go 
back. You may not feel 100% comfortable with its way of handling things, but at 
this point you’d rather talk to SideFX about the issues than looking elsewhere. 
And once you’ve experienced their customer support you’ll have your second 
‘click’ :-)

Andy

> On Feb 17, 2017, at 6:31 AM, Orlando Esponda  
> wrote:
> 
> …
> I'm trying hard to get used to Houdini since I got my Indie lic a couple of 
> weeks back, but for now I can't completely forget about Maya.
> 
> Since the first week of studying the Houdini way, it immediately felt light 
> that's the way to go. Just need a little more time to learn and cold blood to 
> do the switch for a full job.
> 
> 
> Orlando.


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Softimage Mailing List.
To unsubscribe, send a mail to softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com with 
"unsubscribe" in the subject, and reply to confirm.

Re: this is the end......

[Andy Goehler]

Since our website hasn't been updated recently, it should be made clear that 
shading and rendering among others things is now done in Houdini.

Cheers,
Andy

> On 28.01.2016, at 18:07, "Sven Constable"  wrote:
> 
> I just read the job descriptions on your website: 'We primarily work 
> with…Softimage|XSI… occasionally with Maya…'
> I like the idea, AD never happened. lol
> Very nice, Walter!
>  
> From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
> [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of wavo
> Sent: Thursday, January 28, 2016 9:26 AM
> To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
> Subject: Re: this is the end..
>  
> autodeath
> -- 
> 
> 
> Walter Volbers 
> Senior Animator
> 
> FIFTYEIGHT 3D
> Animation & Digital Effects GmbH
> 
> Kontorhaus Osthafen
> Lindleystraße 12
> 60314 Frankfurt am Main
> Germany
> 
> Telefon +49 (0) 69.48 000 55.50
> Telefax +49 (0) 69.48 000 55.15 
> 
> mailto:w...@fiftyeight.com
> http://www.fiftyeight.com
> 
> 
>  
> ESC58 
> Eine Kooperation der escape GmbH und der FIFTYEIGHT3D GmbH
> 
> http://www.ESC58.de 
> 
> 

Re: this is the end......

[Andy Goehler]

No worries, this was meant to address the Maya mention :-)
Andy


> On Jan 28, 2016, at 23:24, Sven Constable <sixsi_l...@imagefront.de> wrote:
> 
> Yes, of course. I didn't want to say anything against SideFX. I'm sorry about 
> that. lol
> sven
>   <>
> From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
> [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Andy Goehler
> Sent: Thursday, January 28, 2016 10:53 PM
> To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
> Subject: Re: this is the end..
>  
> Since our website hasn't been updated recently, it should be made clear that 
> shading and rendering among others things is now done in Houdini.
>  
> Cheers,
> Andy
> 
> On 28.01.2016, at 18:07, "Sven Constable" <sixsi_l...@imagefront.de 
> <mailto:sixsi_l...@imagefront.de>> wrote:
> 
>> I just read the job descriptions on your website: 'We primarily work 
>> with…Softimage|XSI… occasionally with Maya…' 
>> I like the idea, AD never happened. lol
>> Very nice, Walter!
>>  
>> From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
>> <mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com> 
>> [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
>> <mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com>] On Behalf Of wavo
>> Sent: Thursday, January 28, 2016 9:26 AM
>> To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com <mailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com>
>> Subject: Re: this is the end..
>>  
>> autodeath
>> -- 
>> 
>> 
>> Walter Volbers 
>> Senior Animator
>> 
>> FIFTYEIGHT 3D
>> Animation & Digital Effects GmbH
>> 
>> Kontorhaus Osthafen
>> Lindleystraße 12
>> 60314 Frankfurt am Main
>> Germany
>> 
>> Telefon +49 (0) 69.48 000 55.50
>> Telefax +49 (0) 69.48 000 55.15 
>> 
>> mailto:w...@fiftyeight.com <mailto:w...@fiftyeight.com>
>> http://www.fiftyeight.com <http://www.fiftyeight.com/>
>> 
>> 
>>  
>> ESC58 
>> Eine Kooperation der escape GmbH und der FIFTYEIGHT3D GmbH
>> 
>> http://www.ESC58.de  <http://www.esc58.de/>

Re: Have a question an alternative tool

[Andy Goehler]

> On 24.11.2015, at 11:19, Gerbrand Nel  wrote:
> 
> …
> They then see me leave... every day... at 5pm, …
> G

I leave at 4pm :-)

Andy

Re: Exporting Pointclouds to Houdini using Alembic.

[Andy Goehler]

Yes, I have done so. Are you not getting anything or are you missing specific 
attributes? What Soft and Houdini version?

Andy



> On 09.10.2015, at 12:23, Dan Yargici  wrote:
> 
> Hello all.
> 
> Has anyone had any luck exporting pointclouds from Soft to Houdini using 
> Alembic?
> 
> I've tried all manner of combinations with the factory exporter and Crate 
> with all their varying options with exactly zero success.
> 
> Any tips?
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> DAN

Re: Continued use of Softimage question

[Andy Goehler]

Yes, when using packed Alembics (default) only the object declaration is 
written to the IFD. The actual geometry is referenced to the Alembic file on 
disk, hence IFDs stay reasonably small.

 On Aug 20, 2015, at 16:46, Francois Lord flordli...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 What about disk space?
 Can you, in Mantra, reference alembic deforming geometry directly so it 
 doesn't have to be part of the ifd file at each frame?
 
 On 2015-08-20 10:40, Sandy Sutherland wrote:
 At Sunrise we had 5 IFD generating machines (Engine lics), and I wrote a 
 tool to submit renders from Houdini to RR that had the main render job wait 
 for the IFD job to finish, before starting - easy to do.  The IFD generating 
 was pretty quick, so we did not really have machines waiting to render.
 
 On Thu, Aug 20, 2015 at 3:30 PM, Ciaran Moloney moloney.cia...@gmail.com 
 mailto:moloney.cia...@gmail.com wrote:
 Pretty sure that applies also to Mantra renders. But, most places have a 
 smaller pool of engine licenses and export all frames to .ass or .ifd for 
 rendering. Since export times are usually shorter than render times, it 
 works out quite efficiently. But yeah, definitely another expense to 
 consider.
 
 
 On Thu, Aug 20, 2015 at 11:53 AM, Mike Donovan  
 mailto:m...@smoke-mirrors.comm...@smoke-mirrors.com 
 mailto:m...@smoke-mirrors.com wrote:
  One thing that is a bummer with HTOA is that you will need to purchase a 
 Houdini Engine license for every node on your farm unless all the geometry 
 creation is done before rendering.
 
  
 This cost be quite steep … essentially a $500 additional cost to each Arnold 
 license.
 
  
 
 
 

Re: Continued use of Softimage question

[Andy Goehler]

We at Fiftyeight moved on from Softimage to Houdini for scene assembly and 
rendering. While Houdini’s offerings may not be the designed/perfect pass 
system currently, we’ve managed to adjust to a level of comfort. Shading and 
lighting productivity has gone way up. Houdini has proven to be very stable 
during shading and lighting, contrary to my frustration with Soft crashing 
unacceptably often.

We were not looking for the best solution currently available either, we were 
looking for a platform to build upon. And are very happy with Side Effects as a 
software vendor. Licensing, Bugs reports and fixes, feature requests and 
implementation and daily builds make us a satisfied customer.

Andy

Re: Continued use of Softimage question

[Andy Goehler]

Hi Francois,

all Houdini projects so far have been rendered using Mantra. For our type of 
work we’ve found it performing very well in comparison with Arnold. Here’s are 
some of my day to day time savers:

distributed rendering
being able to use the farm on a single frame during lighting is great
artist friendly lights
I have my shortcomings with Arnolds lights, mainly either controlling the 
spread on area lights or texturing spots to get realistic specs
mouse cursor bucket picking
sounds trivial, saves me so much time
IPR window shader picking
ctrl clicking in the render view brings up the properties of that pixels 
shader. click - adjust - done.

That being said, we’re keeping an eye on HtoA and I try to set up new projects 
with Arnold as well and run a comparison.



 On Aug 19, 2015, at 16:39, Francois Lord flordli...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 Hi Andy.
 
 Did you move to Mantra, or stayed with Arnold?
 
 Softimage crashing too often in lookdev is the #1 reason why I'm actively 
 looking elsewhere.
 
 On 19-Aug-15 10:35, Andy Goehler wrote:
 We at Fiftyeight moved on from Softimage to Houdini for scene assembly and 
 rendering. While Houdini’s offerings may not be the designed/perfect pass 
 system currently, we’ve managed to adjust to a level of comfort. Shading and 
 lighting productivity has gone way up. Houdini has proven to be very stable 
 during shading and lighting, contrary to my frustration with Soft crashing 
 unacceptably often.
 
 We were not looking for the best solution currently available either, we 
 were looking for a platform to build upon. And are very happy with Side 
 Effects as a software vendor. Licensing, Bugs reports and fixes, feature 
 requests and implementation and daily builds make us a satisfied customer.
 
 Andy
 

Re: ICE team went to Maya (2011)

[Andy Goehler]

 On Jun 05, 2015, at 22:02, Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 …Houdini says has an ICE team…

Do they? I don’t recall, have any sources?

Re: GATOR - A feature in Softimage since 2008

[Andy Goehler]

 On 28.05.2015, at 13:50, Gerbrand Nel nagv...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 Houdini attribute transfer does some bloody fantastic things if you use it 
 right.
 The more I work in houdini, the more I can come to terms with the death of 
 softimage.

Finally, a mention of Houdini’s Attribute Transfer.

Re: The shadow over The Foundry

[Andy Goehler]

 On Apr 29, 2015, at 04:35, Greg Punchatz g...@janimation.com wrote:
 
  I am not sure where all this Adobe hate comes from,…

It starts with the installer…

Andy

Re: OT: Modo 901 Sneak Peek

[Andy Goehler]

More often than not, for whatever reason, Overrides in Soft were unreliable for 
our projects. Simple animation overrides on a light would not render correct on 
the farm, etc, etc.

Sounds like Modos system is similar to Houdinis Takes, which thus far worked 
very reliable for us. 

Happy weekend,
Andy


 On 10.04.2015, at 16:23, Greg Punchatz g...@janimation.com wrote:
 
 Passes in Modo are a very different thing that what they are in XSI, but once 
 you get the hang of it they're actually a good deal more powerful. Modo's 
 idea of a 'render pass' actually has nothing to do with rendering at all, 
 strictly speaking. Passes in Modo are just containers for unique parameter 
 values. You could animate a camera one way in Pass A, and give it different 
 animation in Pass B. Or a light could have different intensity in one pass 
 than another. Or a character could have different animation...
 
 That's great to hear, but you can do most of what you are saying in XSI since 
 1.0.  Overrides can control almost anything.  I use it to move objects , have 
 different sim settings in ICE, change lighting .

Re: OT: Houdini cluster materials

[Andy Goehler]

I guess it depends on one’s choice of workflow. It’s much more convenient to 
use takes for overrides when materials are at the object level. If you’ve set 
up bundles, it’s basically just a select objects from bundles, set the take and 
assign new materials, done. It’s much more involved to do this at the SOP level.

As far as object merge goes, it’s similar to a live extract polygons from Soft, 
which also does not inherit materials, partitions, etc.

Andy

 On Mar 23, 2015, at 02:07, Nono nnois...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 Hi,
 what i don't clearly understand is how material assignment at object level is 
 useful if object merge don't keep them... ? am i missing something ?
 
 Noël
 
 On Tue, 10 Mar 2015 at 20:08 Jordi Bares Dominguez jordiba...@gmail.com 
 mailto:jordiba...@gmail.com wrote:
 ...
 My take is to try to do things at object level due to easiness with for 
 example transformations, material assignment, scene optimisation and LOD.
 

Re: OT: Houdini cluster materials

[Andy Goehler]

The material SOP sets the ‘shop_materialpath’ attribute on primitives. This 
attribute has a higher priority than object level material assignment.
Same with Softimage actually, a material assigned to a cluster is not 
overridden by it’s object material.

Andy


 On Mar 11, 2015, at 12:33, Cristobal Infante cgc...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 Another thing to note, if you apply materials inside the objects subnets then 
 the material applied on the object level has no effect. 
 I am really just getting started with rendering but this was quite surprising 
 coming from xsi ;)
 
 C
 
 On 11 March 2015 at 09:50, Cristobal Infante cgc...@gmail.com 
 mailto:cgc...@gmail.com wrote:
 Materials in houdini are essentially applied per polygon (primitives in 
 houdini). Check the details view of a geometry that has a material, and the 
 select the primitive icon. You will see each individual poly has got the 
 material applied to it.
 
 By the way, the Details View panel is your best friend. If you are not using 
 it, you are not using houdini very well ;)
 
 C
 
 On 10 March 2015 at 19:08, Jordi Bares Dominguez jordiba...@gmail.com 
 mailto:jordiba...@gmail.com wrote:
 You will certainly use them a lot as you will have surely many streams of 
 data (a bit like if you had in one single object multiple parallel operator 
 stacks that you can blend/merge/dispose/etc…
 
 My take is to try to do things at object level due to easiness with for 
 example transformations, material assignment, scene optimisation and LOD.
 
 For example, every component of a wheel of a car I separate and make objects 
 and have a hierarchy, this allows me to do very quick low resolution objects 
 out of big ones. Transformations are much faster and ultimately I can do 
 clever camera based hiding and what not.
 
 Also given I use bundles a lot having objects is very convenient as I can do 
 text searches that bring the objects to the bundles so it is a major win 
 after a bit of a slow prep time of course.
 
 So I would say my best friend is “object merge” operator rather than merge.
 
 ;-)
 
 hope it helps
 jb
 
 On 10 Mar 2015, at 17:47, Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com 
 mailto:jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 (see addendums in bold)
 
 On 03/10/15 13:32, Jason S wrote:
 On 03/10/15 12:15, Christopher Crouzet wrote: 
 This is a core concept when you have to deal with such graphs—it is so 
 essential that the `Merge` node is probably one of the most used nodes in 
 Houdini. 
 I can understand why, whether for optimization, [or] manageability 
 purposes. 
 Groups in Houdini share roughly the same purpose than clusters from 
 Softimage. 
 They are a core concept in Houdini as every node understand them. What you 
 can do with clusters, you can do with groups, and much more out of the 
 box. 
 I can imagine, as core [or as basic of a concept] as in Soft I would 
 assume. [or so it would seem]
 
 And thanks for the, I think important clarification.
 
 
 
 
 

Re: Maya thinks they're clever....and that's the problem

[Andy Goehler]

The render tree is limited to… shader nodes. You can’t pull e.g. a transform 
node from the scene into it and drive a shader. In the ICE tree you can, for 
the most part as well with hyper shade, IIRC.

Andy

 On Feb 17, 2015, at 19:22, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@hybride.com wrote:
 
 Why isn't Render Tree good? It's a tree of nodes for rendering...
 
 Same with ICE Tree. 
 
 Eric T.
 
 On 2/17/2015 1:16 PM, Rob Wuijster wrote:
 Should have been 'Render Schematic View ;-P
 Rob
 
 \/-\/\/
 On 17-2-2015 19:10, Simon Reeves wrote:
 render tree isn't the best!
 
 
 
 Simon Reeves
 London, UK
 si...@simonreeves.com mailto:si...@simonreeves.com
 www.simonreeves.com http://www.simonreeves.com/
 www.analogstudio.co.uk http://www.analogstudio.co.uk/
 
 

Re: [Maya] Arnold Render Region

[Andy Goehler]

Yeah, there's a limit to the time and head aches I'm willing to spend on my 
tool chain.


 On 10.12.2014, at 09:56, Cristobal Infante cgc...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 All of this 3rd party tools, bring no joy to me. All it takes is for the 
 author to move onto something else and the plugin will die on a version of 
 Maya. Remember some plugins need to be recompiled with every new version.
 
 
 
 On Tuesday, 9 December 2014, Oscar Juarez tridi.animei...@gmail.com wrote:
 They want to release it early next year, but it's not specified if it will 
 be free or commercial. 
 
 
 On Tue, Dec 9, 2014 at 3:24 PM, gareth bell garethb...@outlook.com wrote:
 Of course it's third party - but a bonus for Maya none-the-less
 
 https://vimeo.com/113739217

Re: Zbrush and vertex IDs

[Andy Goehler]

I’ve noticed this behavior post Softimage 2010 releases. Where with the OBJ 
exports the vertex order is not preserved. It caused us many headaches and 
countless numbers of redoing UVs. Like you I have nothing reproduce able, 
however your chances of the bug increases when you mirrored the mesh before. 
It’s odd — I’ve advised my team to export to .OBJ and reimport before rigging 
and UVing. It’s a Softimage bug, not ZBrush.

Nowadays, I just import both meshes into Houdini and use the Match topology 
SOP. Bingo.

Andy


 On Dec 06, 2014, at 11:28, Sebastien Sterling sebastien.sterl...@gmail.com 
 wrote:
 
 Ive noticed now a couple of times when sending a mesh back into sofrimage, 
 that 
 
 the uv's get erased or that the vertex order, or ID is different, often this 
 seems to 
 
 happen regardless of what degree of manipulation i want to effect. I can't 
 seem to 
 
 find a reocuring reproducible source for this, with the possible exception of 
 dividing 
 
 the mesh, adding a sub div level, something you can do in mudbox without any 
 issues.
 
 Is there some guard, some box I can tick to tell zBrush to preserve vertex 
 order ? or at the very least will prompt me if a perticular manipulation is 
 going to break it ?
 
 
 Many thanks and a good weekend to you !
 
 - Seb

Re: realistic hair shading SI-MR

[Andy Goehler]

Hey Leendert, look here:

http://www.3delight.com/en/modules/PunBB/viewtopic.php?id=2030 
http://www.3delight.com/en/modules/PunBB/viewtopic.php?id=2030

Oldie but goodie. 


 On Dec 06, 2014, at 14:08, Leendert A. Hartog hirazib...@live.nl wrote:
 
 Thanks, I was just coming to the same conclusion... ;)
 In 3delight would the converted Softimage hair shaders suffice
 or would still have to look for some custom shader?
 
 Greetz
 Leendert
 
 -- 
 
 Leendert A. Hartog AKA Hirazi Blue
 Administrator NOT the owner of si-community.com
 

Re: OT Houdini 14 Sneak Peak

[Andy Goehler]

What’s your beef with Mantra?

 On 05.12.2014, at 14:02, olivier jeannel olivier.jean...@noos.fr wrote:
 
 The big problem for me is mantra. Just not usable without a renderfarm (In my 
 unexperienced opinion, of course)

Re: OT Houdini 14 Sneak Peak

[Andy Goehler]

Just as others commented. For a CPU renderer Mantras speed is up there with the 
big ones, but it’s also enormously flexible without having to resort to 
external compiling. And most importantly: my shading and lighting sessions are 
stable! Often times I forget to stop the IPR, switch to the viewport, modify 
geometry only to come back to the IPR pane and see it rendering my changes 
already. 
Glass was not straight forward at first, but I’ve managed to reduce my noise to 
an acceptable level.

Coming from a GPU renderer you’ll have a hard time bearing the render times of 
a CPU renderer ;-)

 On Dec 05, 2014, at 17:09, olivier jeannel olivier.jean...@noos.fr wrote:
 
 I find it slow.
 Rendering glass without noise seems impossible.
 I confess I'm use to Redshift speed, and just saw a friend using Octane for 
 C4D.
 Results are costless compared to the effort Mantra requires.
 
 Don't you agree ?
 
 
 
 Le 05/12/2014 14:45, Andy Goehler a écrit :
 What’s your beef with Mantra?
 
 On 05.12.2014, at 14:02, olivier jeannel olivier.jean...@noos.fr 
 mailto:olivier.jean...@noos.fr wrote:
 
 The big problem for me is mantra. Just not usable without a renderfarm (In 
 my unexperienced opinion, of course)
 
 

Re: OT Houdini 14 Sneak Peak

[Andy Goehler]

Nice one Leendert, refering to Total Recall ;-)
Originally I had the Matrix in mind, because once you free your mind in Houdini 
you won’t have to dodge the bullets ;-) 

 On Dec 05, 2014, at 15:54, Leendert A. Hartog hirazib...@live.nl wrote:
 
 Andy Goehler schreef op 5-12-2014 7:00:
 
 Yeah, depending on how your brain is wired, it IS the 'red pill' ;-)
 
 Matrix red pill or Total Recall red pill? 
 There is a subtle difference, but trying to explain that would be way beyond 
 OT...
 (which this remark already is)
 ;)
 
 Greetz
 Leendert
 
 
 
 -- 
 
 Leendert A. Hartog AKA Hirazi Blue 
 Administrator NOT the owner of si-community.com
 

Re: OT Houdini 14 Sneak Peak

[Andy Goehler]

Yeah, depending on how your brain is wired, it IS the 'red pill' ;-)


 On Dec 05, 2014, at 04:53, Simon van de Lagemaat si...@theembassyvfx.com 
 wrote:
 
 I don't know about everyone else but I've been learning Houdini for a couple 
 months now and I am totally awestruck by it despite some weak areas that it 
 looks like it's improving on.The flow of data through the program is 
 wonderful and far better than Soft.  I got comfortable quite quickly with it. 
  Helps to have a few guys around that know it ;-)
 
 You can move compounds and vex nodes all over the place with very little 
 transition work i.e. I'm moving a deformer sop over to a shader with just 
 some coordinate conversions and I can easily build interfaces and connections 
 with uniformity and predictability.  I'm very happy with it and I haven't 
 even touched the dynamics or volume tools at all.
 
 
 On Thu, Dec 4, 2014 at 1:19 PM, Oscar Juarez tridi.animei...@gmail.com 
 mailto:tridi.animei...@gmail.com wrote:
 UX improvements seem like something much needed.
 
 https://vimeo.com/113441818 https://vimeo.com/113441818

Re: Service Pack 1 available

[Andy Goehler]

AD received a hefty amount of maintenance dollars from us for their promise to 
deliver until April 2016.
Yes, we expected more.

 On Dec 02, 2014, at 22:20, Mirko Jankovic mirkoj.anima...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 well probably sounding harsh but still seems completely normal that they 
 would just cut of development for product already dead and save money 
 instead... not like that is not to be expected
 

The ripping goes toward his management. Bravo to the trooper still digging into 
the code ;-)

 On Tue, Dec 2, 2014 at 10:17 PM, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@hybride.com 
 mailto:ethivie...@hybride.com wrote:
 That poor single developer left on Softimage bug fixes. All of their hard 
 work and all they get is a ripping on the list. Nice going everyone... now 
 we'll never see an SP2...
 
 Eric T.

Re: Need your opinion to improve Maya Outliner/ Attribute Editor

[Andy Goehler]

Yes, I can relate to that. Some minds just work better spatially. I guess 
that’s why I feel at home in the render tree, Nuke and Houdini ;-)

Cheers

 On Nov 28, 2014, at 19:29, Martin Chatterjee 
 martin.chatterjee.li...@googlemail.com wrote:
 
 (yes, I am one of those 5 users left that make heavy use of the Schematic 
 View...)

Re: Need your opinion to improve Maya Outliner/ Attribute Editor

[Andy Goehler]

Great point. For all the love fest that the Explorer gets I wish this had been 
implemented all along. So many Softimage users are so tied to the Explorer 
because it offers alot, but also because the schematic view is so lame.

 On Nov 26, 2014, at 18:18, Ponthieux, Joseph G. (LARC-E1A)[LITES] 
 j.ponthi...@nasa.gov wrote:
 
 Outliner should have a concept for buckets. Think of this as passive or 
 soft organization methods which do not effect the hierarchical parenting of 
 objects but allows you to throw any object no matter how it is parented , or 
 not parented, into an organization system for managing hundred of curves and 
 surfaces. This would be most useful when modeling in nurbs when you have 
 dozens of rails or other reference objects that are being used to create 
 surfaces or or other curves. You need some way to organize these objects 
 which is non heirarchical and strictly only an Outliner centric organization 
 method. A softimage person might think of these as groups, but groups mean 
 something entirely different in Maya. Groups in softimge are not entirely 
 explorer centric either. What i want is an outliner only way of organizing 
 objects which does not affect their status within the scene.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

[Andy Goehler]

In german culture, it's brown when speaking of Hitler or Nazis. Please try 
again ;-)

On Sep 11, 2014, at 5:05, Sebastien Sterling sebastien.sterl...@gmail.com 
wrote:

 Man the gray of Maya's UI sure reminds me of Hitler (is that better ? :P)

Re: alembic from hou to xsi issues

[Andy Goehler]

Hi Sebastian,

as already mentioned Exocortex Crate does this reliable.
See here: http://exocortex.com/blog/crate_custom_attribute_softimage

Just a side note, getting custom attributes from XSI into Houdini can be a pain 
too and I’ve had much better luck exporting those from 2015 with its onboard 
Alembic than with Crate.

Andy

On Sep 10, 2014, at 17:29, Sebastian Kowalski l...@sekow.com wrote:

 I am exporting some points into an alembic file from houdini to xsi and 
 stumble on one issue. 
 
 Transferring attributes works good for what you could call 'factory 
 attributes' like P or v (we have to rename that to something with more than 
 just one letter, cause it wont appear in xsi). 
 But I also compute angular velocity (w) and couple other 'arbitrary user 
 attributes', all vectors (3f). This suckers come in as single float value. 
 Not even as a array of 3 values per point. 
 
 As the same alembic file works like expected as re-import in houdini, I am 
 pretty sure it is an eff up in xsi. 
 Just want to make sure I am not doing something stupid. 
 Anyone experience the same? 
 Its with the 2015 version of xsi.
 
 sebastian
 
 
 --
 http://www.sekow.com

Re: Autodesk considering ditching perpetual licenses

[Andy Goehler]

On Aug 31, 2014, at 15:00, Tim Leydecker bauero...@gmx.de wrote:

 P.S: In terms of license options and entry level fees, I´m no fan of the 
 foundry.
 I can´t justify having a nuke or even nukeX license just for dabbling with it 
 on
 my home/dev/tests machine.

PLE

Re: Fabric at Siggraph details

[Andy Goehler]

On Jul 30, 2014, at 14:05, Paul Doyle technove...@gmail.com wrote:

 …(and people with their damn Macs)…

Instead of criticizing peoples excellent taste for hardware and operation 
system, get to work on those ‘damn’ rounded rectangles :-)
May the hexagon be with you.

Andy

Re: Maya 2015 Node Editor

[Andy Goehler]

Same here.

On Jul 15, 2014, at 22:28, Simon van de Lagemaat si...@theembassyvfx.com 
wrote:

 As of now we're probably shifting lighting, shading and scene setup in 
 Houdini instead of Maya now that HtoA is in play. It's much closer to Soft in 
 terms of usability and UI maturity.  We primarily use Arnold but Mantra is a 
 fantastic sidekick and when you combine them you end up with an amazingly 
 powerful triumvirate. 

Re: 2015 SP1

[Andy Goehler]

Sebastian, Magic is not for everyone. Some are confused by it :-)


 On 06.07.2014, at 22:21, Sebastian Kowalski l...@sekow.com wrote:
 
 
 
 there is a perfect sp1 available at sidefx..
 
 
 
 
 Am 04.07.2014 um 22:30 schrieb Luc-Eric Rousseau luceri...@gmail.com:
 
 Softimage 2015 is perfect already!
 
 

Re: Renderman price restructuring

[Andy Goehler]

While I’m still on honeymoon with Arnold I have to say that its ‘out of the 
box’ shaders leave quite some room for improvement. 

Examples:

Standard shader: lacks a second specular layer (quite the standard these days), 
back facing is not textureable
Fur shader: you only get 'Kajija-Kay’ (very old school) shading, no indirect 
specular, no translucency, no glints
Single scatter SSS is only a function in the API and currently does not 
implement indirect lighting. 

While some of these deficits can be solved in the render tree, others are 
simply not accessible without coding them yourself or relying on community 
generosity. Which has been the situation for the past four years.

That being said, Anders Langlands is now working at Solid Angle as a shader 
developer. He has previously shared shaders that address a lot of the above and 
beyond. I see a bright future ;-)

Happy Rendering,

Andy

On May 30, 2014, at 14:19, Marc-Andre Carbonneau 
marc-andre.carbonn...@ubisoft.com wrote:

 Ya...what they don't tell you is the hidden cost of programmers you have to 
 pay to get it working afterwards...
 
 Viva Arnold!
 
 
 -Original Message-
 From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
 [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Leendert A. 
 Hartog
 Sent: 30 mai 2014 07:41
 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 Subject: Renderman price restructuring
 
 Some industry nice that might interest some of you (I hope):
 Pixar has announced a radical price restructuring of its RenderMan 3D and 
 animation technology. With the upcoming version, the software will be free to 
 non-commercial customers, and will cost $495 for individual licenses
 Quoted from here: http://waa.ai/4jn8
 
 Or better yet: go to the appropriate page on the Renderman website directly 
 http://tinyurl.com/nkbmw8u
 
 crossposted from the si-community, BTW
 
 Greetz
 Leendert
 
 -- 
 
 Leendert A. Hartog AKA Hirazi Blue
 Administrator NOT the owner of si-community.com
 
 

Re: Houdini Weaknesses

[Andy Goehler]

On May 21, 2014, at 23:15, Jordi Bares jordiba...@gmail.com wrote:

 - Shading is very granular and the examples and setups provided are not very 
 good so once you get it is good but not great yet. The actual implementation 
 of Arnold for Houdini is s much user friendly (looks a quite a lot like 
 the render tree to be honest)

Hi Jordi,

I’m not quite sure I understand regarding Arnold in Houdini. Wether using 
Mantra or Arnold it ends up with a similar VEX graph doesn’t it? If I drop down 
a Mantra shader using a ‘Surface Shader Builder’ I get an empty ‘Rendertree’ – 
adding a ‘surfacemodel’ I’m right at home, no difference to Arnold. Maybe I’ve 
missed something, what are you referring to user friendliness in particular?

What I do love, and stated elsewhere on the list, is the flexibility that 
Mantra brings with it without having to go full C++ in an IDE.

cheers

Andy

Re: Houdini Weaknesses

[Andy Goehler]

Thank you for expanding on the subject Jordi,

having a second look, it is apparent that you can only access Arnold compatible 
nodes inside Arnold Materials. Also the image node for example comes with UV 
options that indeed is so much more user friendly. 

cheers

Andy

Re: OT: Now that the grief over softimage, how did you get over your it on your daily basis?

[Andy Goehler]

I’m still grieving over Softimages instability during shading and lighting ;-/

http://xsisupport.com/2013/09/11/getting-crash-dirty-exit-and-clean-exit-counts/

And our numbers look even worse.

Andy

Re: OT: Now that the grief over softimage, how did you get over your it on your daily basis?

[Andy Goehler]

Right you are, my Houdini love affair started quite while ago. But I truly fell 
in love with it when I did actual work in it. 

Andy 

On May 22, 2014, at 20:44, Cristobal Infante cgc...@gmail.com wrote:

 I've got over it by diving into Houdini, to more I learn the more I want to 
 dive deeper ;). It's not a complete solution just yet, but I am sure it will 
 be ;)

Re: SI and Houdini

[Andy Goehler]

 On 21.05.2014, at 19:35, Ciaran Moloney moloney.cia...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 Mantra aint too shabby...

I'm running a test scene and surprisingly Mantra keeps pace with Arnold 
speed/quality wise (brute force). I really like all the options that Mantra 
brings along. There's is an unmatched flexibility with lights, objects and 
shaders with Mantra all inside Houdini without having to resort to external C++ 
IDEs.

Andy

Re: First Softimage - Maya transition videos posted

[Andy Goehler]

Nukes script editor behaves the same way. Down to the Selection and Ctrl-Enter 
to execute. For the reason Raf has mentioned.

Looking into Houdini there seems to be all options: the python shell and the 
editor which does not delete the code :-)

Andy

 On 13.05.2014, at 05:01, Matt Lind ml...@carbinestudios.com wrote:
 
 Honestly, I cannot think of another ‘script editor’ in any application that 
 behaves in the way Maya’s does by deleting code upon clicking the execute 
 button.  

Re: ICE Exodus - porting ICE to VEX part 1

[Andy Goehler]

Hi Nika,

very nice video. You should post this on the SESI forum too. With my limited 
VOP experience I was able to export data with ‘Bind Export’. I’m currently 
recreating your VOP setup to look into it.

Andy



On May 06, 2014, at 9:09, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:

 
 yo, raps !!!
 
 friends, take a look
 https://vimeo.com/94066674
 
 How to port our precious ICE stuff into houdini vex. Questions raised - how 
 to create a custom parameter in VEX, just like we do in ICE, and why there 
 are different results in math.
 This is interesting i think.
 If you know the answers feel free to comment )))
 Hakuna Matata ))) ahahahaha 
 

Re: ICE Exodus - porting ICE to VEX part 1

[Andy Goehler]

sidefx.com and then register for the forum.

On May 06, 2014, at 11:28, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:

 thank you friends !!!
 SESI forum? what is it? Andy, could you give a link?
 And what is Blind Export?
 ahahah ))) great, great, more questions appearing...a good sign
 
 
 2014-05-06 13:24 GMT+04:00 Andy Goehler lists.andy.goeh...@gmail.com:
 Hi Nika,
 
 very nice video. You should post this on the SESI forum too. With my limited 
 VOP experience I was able to export data with ‘Bind Export’. I’m currently 
 recreating your VOP setup to look into it.
 
 Andy
 
 
 
 On May 06, 2014, at 9:09, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 
 yo, raps !!!
 
 friends, take a look
 https://vimeo.com/94066674
 
 How to port our precious ICE stuff into houdini vex. Questions raised - how 
 to create a custom parameter in VEX, just like we do in ICE, and why there 
 are different results in math.
 This is interesting i think.
 If you know the answers feel free to comment )))
 Hakuna Matata ))) ahahahaha 
 
 
 

Re: ICE Exodus - porting ICE to VEX part 1

[Andy Goehler]

Side Effects Software Inc. 

That’s my guess ;-)

On May 06, 2014, at 11:52, Rob Chapman tekano@gmail.com wrote:

 Side Effects Software I = International...?
 
 
 On 6 May 2014 10:40, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:
 aaah, i`m already there ))) didn`t know that it is named SESI 
 
 
 2014-05-06 13:36 GMT+04:00 Andy Goehler lists.andy.goeh...@gmail.com:
 
 sidefx.com and then register for the forum.
 
 On May 06, 2014, at 11:28, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 thank you friends !!!
 SESI forum? what is it? Andy, could you give a link?
 And what is Blind Export?
 ahahah ))) great, great, more questions appearing...a good sign
 
 
 2014-05-06 13:24 GMT+04:00 Andy Goehler lists.andy.goeh...@gmail.com:
 Hi Nika,
 
 very nice video. You should post this on the SESI forum too. With my limited 
 VOP experience I was able to export data with ‘Bind Export’. I’m currently 
 recreating your VOP setup to look into it.
 
 Andy
 
 
 
 On May 06, 2014, at 9:09, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 
 yo, raps !!!
 
 friends, take a look
 https://vimeo.com/94066674
 
 How to port our precious ICE stuff into houdini vex. Questions raised - how 
 to create a custom parameter in VEX, just like we do in ICE, and why there 
 are different results in math.
 This is interesting i think.
 If you know the answers feel free to comment )))
 Hakuna Matata ))) ahahahaha 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Re: ICE Exodus - porting ICE to VEX part 1

[Andy Goehler]

There’s definitively something strange in VOPs or it’s something I have not 
wrapped my head around, but a simple point expression seems to do the job.
Let’s take this further at the SESI forum so some Houdini cracks will have a 
look at it. I’ve uploaded the .hip there as I feel dirty attaching it to this 
list :-P

Andy


On May 06, 2014, at 9:09, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:

 
 yo, raps !!!
 
 friends, take a look
 https://vimeo.com/94066674
 
 How to port our precious ICE stuff into houdini vex. Questions raised - how 
 to create a custom parameter in VEX, just like we do in ICE, and why there 
 are different results in math.
 This is interesting i think.
 If you know the answers feel free to comment )))
 Hakuna Matata ))) ahahahaha 
 

Re: ICE Exodus - porting ICE to VEX part 1

[Andy Goehler]

sure, go ahead and attach it. glad I could help a little bit.

Andy

Sent on the road

 On 06.05.2014, at 15:07, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:
 
  Andy showed 4 different variants of doing the same thing in houdini - very 
 handy and illustrative.
 Never knew about the Point Wrangle node - it is so cool - heh, i`m not 
 actually a great fan of inserting code in channels - damn hard to realize how 
 the stuff is working lately.
 Point Wrangle could be a nice option. 
 
 Andy, you did a great job !!! i want to attach your scenes to the video? 
 can i do it?
 
 
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:52 GMT+04:00 Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com:
 the full sanostol answer in case i misundersood something
 
 to solve the mismatch in the results, add a degree to radians vop in You 
 network in front of all trigonometric functions, like sin and cos, they 
 expect all values in radians. in hscript degrees are ok 
 
 for the parameter stuff, I'm not sure what You are trying to achive. It 
 looks like You are writing data to geometry in the first set data , and then 
 read it out later. I'm not sure why You want this, but that does not work 
 that way in houdini,You can not work import data in the same vex tree that 
 is set here. that must happen in a previous vopsop
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:50 GMT+04:00 Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com:
 
 
 How to port our precious ICE stuff into houdini vex. Questions raised - how 
 to create a custom parameter in VEX, just like we do in ICE, and why there 
 are different results in math.
 
 ok i got the answers from houdini experts - sanostol and Stefano Jannuzzo
 
 1 You can not work import data in the same vex tree that is set here. that 
 must happen in a previous vopsop
 2 I think the problem is with the trigonometry nodes, since ICE treats the 
 input as degrees, Houdini as radians.
 
 You are mixing the two in your graphs, however if you want to get the same 
 behavior in Houdini, you should plug a dagtorad node between your t and the 
 sin and cos nodes.
 dropbox.com/s/olcfye6aea0dqmc/ice_cycloid_fix%20copy.jpg
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:45 GMT+04:00 Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com:
 
 thank you, Stefano, your help is much appreciated !!!
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:25 GMT+04:00 Stefano Jannuzzo stefano.jannu...@gmail.com:
 
 Ooops, too late I read the same answer on the houdini forum
 
 
 On Tue, May 6, 2014 at 2:20 PM, Stefano Jannuzzo 
 stefano.jannu...@gmail.com wrote:
 Nice.
 I think the problem is with the trigonometry nodes, since ICE treats the 
 input as degrees, Houdini as radians.
 You are mixing the two in your graphs, however if you want to get the 
 same behavior in Houdini, you should plug a dagtorad node between your t 
 and the sin and cos nodes.
 Ciao
 
 
 On Tue, May 6, 2014 at 9:09 AM, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com 
 wrote:
 
 yo, raps !!!
 
 friends, take a look
 https://vimeo.com/94066674
 
 How to port our precious ICE stuff into houdini vex. Questions raised - 
 how to create a custom parameter in VEX, just like we do in ICE, and 
 why there are different results in math.
 This is interesting i think.
 If you know the answers feel free to comment )))
 Hakuna Matata ))) ahahahaha 
 

Re: ICE Exodus - porting ICE to VEX part 1

[Andy Goehler]

I believe  this is not possible inside the same VOPSOP. 

Andy

 On 06.05.2014, at 15:30, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 h...bind export node...i write blind export ahahah ))) okay, i`ll dig it 
 later, seems to be complex stuff... and could it be read in the same VEX 
 tree, just like in ICE with get data?
 
 
 2014-05-06 17:25 GMT+04:00 Andy Goehler lists.andy.goeh...@gmail.com:
 sure, go ahead and attach it. glad I could help a little bit.
 
 Andy
 
 Sent on the road
 
 On 06.05.2014, at 15:07, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:
 
  Andy showed 4 different variants of doing the same thing in houdini - very 
 handy and illustrative.
 Never knew about the Point Wrangle node - it is so cool - heh, i`m not 
 actually a great fan of inserting code in channels - damn hard to realize 
 how the stuff is working lately.
 Point Wrangle could be a nice option. 
 
 Andy, you did a great job !!! i want to attach your scenes to the video? 
 can i do it?
 
 
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:52 GMT+04:00 Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com:
 the full sanostol answer in case i misundersood something
 
 to solve the mismatch in the results, add a degree to radians vop in You 
 network in front of all trigonometric functions, like sin and cos, they 
 expect all values in radians. in hscript degrees are ok 
 
 for the parameter stuff, I'm not sure what You are trying to achive. It 
 looks like You are writing data to geometry in the first set data , and 
 then read it out later. I'm not sure why You want this, but that does not 
 work that way in houdini,You can not work import data in the same vex tree 
 that is set here. that must happen in a previous vopsop
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:50 GMT+04:00 Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com:
 
 
 How to port our precious ICE stuff into houdini vex. Questions raised - 
 how to create a custom parameter in VEX, just like we do in ICE, and why 
 there are different results in math.
 
 ok i got the answers from houdini experts - sanostol and Stefano Jannuzzo
 
 1 You can not work import data in the same vex tree that is set here. 
 that must happen in a previous vopsop
 2 I think the problem is with the trigonometry nodes, since ICE treats 
 the input as degrees, Houdini as radians.
 
 You are mixing the two in your graphs, however if you want to get the 
 same behavior in Houdini, you should plug a dagtorad node between your t 
 and the sin and cos nodes.
 dropbox.com/s/olcfye6aea0dqmc/ice_cycloid_fix%20copy.jpg
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:45 GMT+04:00 Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com:
 
 thank you, Stefano, your help is much appreciated !!!
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:25 GMT+04:00 Stefano Jannuzzo stefano.jannu...@gmail.com:
 
 Ooops, too late I read the same answer on the houdini forum
 
 
 On Tue, May 6, 2014 at 2:20 PM, Stefano Jannuzzo 
 stefano.jannu...@gmail.com wrote:
 Nice.
 I think the problem is with the trigonometry nodes, since ICE treats 
 the input as degrees, Houdini as radians.
 You are mixing the two in your graphs, however if you want to get the 
 same behavior in Houdini, you should plug a dagtorad node between your 
 t and the sin and cos nodes.
 Ciao
 
 
 On Tue, May 6, 2014 at 9:09 AM, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com 
 wrote:
 
 yo, raps !!!
 
 friends, take a look
 https://vimeo.com/94066674
 
 How to port our precious ICE stuff into houdini vex. Questions raised 
 - how to create a custom parameter in VEX, just like we do in ICE, 
 and why there are different results in math.
 This is interesting i think.
 If you know the answers feel free to comment )))
 Hakuna Matata ))) ahahahaha 
 

Re: ICE Exodus - porting ICE to VEX part 1

[Andy Goehler]

with the 'parameter' node you can get data


 On 06.05.2014, at 15:42, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 i mean, ok, i inserted the bind export node, but how to read it now? what 
 will be the get data analog? 
 
 
 2014-05-06 17:30 GMT+04:00 Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com:
 h...bind export node...i write blind export ahahah ))) okay, i`ll dig it 
 later, seems to be complex stuff... and could it be read in the same VEX 
 tree, just like in ICE with get data?
 
 
 2014-05-06 17:25 GMT+04:00 Andy Goehler lists.andy.goeh...@gmail.com:
 
 sure, go ahead and attach it. glad I could help a little bit.
 
 Andy
 
 Sent on the road
 
 On 06.05.2014, at 15:07, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com wrote:
 
  Andy showed 4 different variants of doing the same thing in houdini - 
 very handy and illustrative.
 Never knew about the Point Wrangle node - it is so cool - heh, i`m not 
 actually a great fan of inserting code in channels - damn hard to realize 
 how the stuff is working lately.
 Point Wrangle could be a nice option. 
 
 Andy, you did a great job !!! i want to attach your scenes to the video? 
 can i do it?
 
 
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:52 GMT+04:00 Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com:
 the full sanostol answer in case i misundersood something
 
 to solve the mismatch in the results, add a degree to radians vop in You 
 network in front of all trigonometric functions, like sin and cos, they 
 expect all values in radians. in hscript degrees are ok 
 
 for the parameter stuff, I'm not sure what You are trying to achive. It 
 looks like You are writing data to geometry in the first set data , and 
 then read it out later. I'm not sure why You want this, but that does not 
 work that way in houdini,You can not work import data in the same vex 
 tree that is set here. that must happen in a previous vopsop
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:50 GMT+04:00 Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com:
 
 
 How to port our precious ICE stuff into houdini vex. Questions raised - 
 how to create a custom parameter in VEX, just like we do in ICE, and why 
 there are different results in math.
 
 ok i got the answers from houdini experts - sanostol and Stefano Jannuzzo
 
 1 You can not work import data in the same vex tree that is set here. 
 that must happen in a previous vopsop
 2 I think the problem is with the trigonometry nodes, since ICE treats 
 the input as degrees, Houdini as radians.
 
 You are mixing the two in your graphs, however if you want to get the 
 same behavior in Houdini, you should plug a dagtorad node between your t 
 and the sin and cos nodes.
 dropbox.com/s/olcfye6aea0dqmc/ice_cycloid_fix%20copy.jpg
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:45 GMT+04:00 Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com:
 
 thank you, Stefano, your help is much appreciated !!!
 
 
 2014-05-06 16:25 GMT+04:00 Stefano Jannuzzo 
 stefano.jannu...@gmail.com:
 
 Ooops, too late I read the same answer on the houdini forum
 
 
 On Tue, May 6, 2014 at 2:20 PM, Stefano Jannuzzo 
 stefano.jannu...@gmail.com wrote:
 Nice.
 I think the problem is with the trigonometry nodes, since ICE treats 
 the input as degrees, Houdini as radians.
 You are mixing the two in your graphs, however if you want to get the 
 same behavior in Houdini, you should plug a dagtorad node between 
 your t and the sin and cos nodes.
 Ciao
 
 
 On Tue, May 6, 2014 at 9:09 AM, Nika Ragua nikaragu...@gmail.com 
 wrote:
 
 yo, raps !!!
 
 friends, take a look
 https://vimeo.com/94066674
 
 How to port our precious ICE stuff into houdini vex. Questions 
 raised - how to create a custom parameter in VEX, just like we do in 
 ICE, and why there are different results in math.
 This is interesting i think.
 If you know the answers feel free to comment )))
 Hakuna Matata ))) ahahahaha 
 

Re: A Good Read!

[Andy Goehler]

Is that AD internal assumptions or have you ever approached your customers with 
the idea of a bug/usability fix upgrade? Honestly?

Andy

On Apr 01, 2014, at 21:39, Maurice Patel maurice.pa...@autodesk.com wrote:

 While everyone will argue that stability and usability are important they 
 don't want to pay for it

Re: A Good Read!

[Andy Goehler]

Hey Marcel, Sebastien and Rob,

it was sincere question, I didn’t intend to offend.
I guess it comes down to customer relation and communication, both of which 
have been talk about enough already.

That sentence I replied to just triggered a button.

Sorry,

Andy

On Apr 01, 2014, at 22:51, Rob Chapman tekano@gmail.com wrote:

 Hey Seb and Andy, am fairly certain that Maurice here in this instance
 is not representing Autodesk and the really large IMO he started with
 means quite clearly 'in my opinion'  :)   I get what you are saying,
 but had enough AD bashing for now, 'fish in a barrel'... this thread
 was just getting interesting.

Re: humanize maya, SOFT top 5

[Andy Goehler]

If you're going to humanize this is a  MUST read to all UI/UX designers.
Then have a look at the Softimage UI — rounded corners everywhere!

http://uxmovement.com/thinking/why-rounded-corners-are-easier-on-the-eyes/

Also, continue reading the references at the bottom.

Have a great day,

Andy

Re: my first experiment with rigging in Houdini :-))))

[Andy Goehler]

Sebastian, take it slowly and all will be well ;-)

As much as people like to refer VOPs/VEX to ICE, I’d say keep in mind they are 
quite different.
While ICE cracks tend to go hardcore in ‘one' Tree, the Houdini guys use VOPs 
in conjunction with the other OPs available to make up the overall result.

See you over at the SESI forum.

Andy

On Mar 21, 2014, at 10:20, Sebastian Kowalski l...@sekow.com wrote:

 initial shock is a good one, feels like being hit by a roadtrain.. twice 
 
 
 Am 21.03.2014 um 09:49 schrieb Raffaele Fragapane 
 raffsxsil...@googlemail.com:
 
 Yeah, if there is one thing to say for Houdini, much like ICE did for Soft 
 users, is that if you persevere through the initial shock it's an amazing 
 enabler for learning the fundamentals of this trade.
 
 It's worth trying it regardless of whether you plan to use it or not at 
 least for that.
 

Re: What use is ICE really?

[Andy Goehler]

That sounds interesting, care to give me a hint?

Andy

On Mar 21, 2014, at 13:58, Sebastian Kowalski l...@sekow.com wrote:

 procedural aov management

Re: Autodesk webinar

[Andy Goehler]

Moving from Softimage|3D to XSI 1.0 felt exactly the same ;-)

Andy

On Mar 18, 2014, at 23:23, Jordi Bares jordiba...@gmail.com wrote:

 … instead they threw FCPX to the table clearly unfinished, from the ground up 
 amazing ideas but not finished and truly not to the standard of the industry.

Re: ICE in Maya is it really possible?

[Andy Goehler]

Amen. Finally some sensible words — thank you Raffaele.

Andy


On Mar 16, 2014, at 12:11, Raffaele Fragapane raffsxsil...@googlemail.com 
wrote:

 Honestly, I don't know why people keep  mentioning things such as she of vote 
 or rewrites and the such. XSI wasn't rewritten to get ICE with its current 
 considerable set of limitations (some of which aren't present in splice on 
 Maya), but everybody wants so badly for Maya to be called older, when in 
 actuality it's clunkier, horribly fragmented, but arguably a lot younger and 
 more modern than Soft at this point.
 
 People have a perception of modernity based on their interaction with a mix 
 of look, slickness and use experience, and then think and wasn't too the 
 mythical core of the app to be equally modern or ancient based on how it 
 feels, but the two things are seldom related.
 

Re: SI and Houdini

[Andy Goehler]

It’s been a rough time ever since the acquisition of Softimage by AD. And the 
community has been held hostage with maintenance ever since (similar to the 
situation Softimage|3D to XSI I might add). Our company has dropped maintenance 
for four licenses two years ago and last year for the remaining six.

It came basically came down to one thing: We decided what kind of customer we 
didn’t want to be.

As customers of Arnold, Exocortex and Nuke we’ve had unmatched customer service 
from their vendors and we couldn’t cope with the situation we were in with AD 
any longer.

From what I gather SideFX is yet another company with such a great reputation 
to customer service. And judging from their on forum and odforce there’s an 
awesome community out their. If you treat them with respect to their culture 
(aka don’t be a d*ck about what has worked better in your past) you’ll be 
helped at once.

As Jordi already mentioned here and in the SideFX forums, there is a lot to 
like in Houdini. Just don’t expect it to be Softimage, just as you wouldn’t 
expect a layer based compositor to work like a node based one.

Andy


On Mar 09, 2014, at 12:49, Jordi Bares jordiba...@gmail.com wrote:

 Once you see how responsive Side Effects Dev team is you will wonder where 
 were the dollars going at Autodesk.

Re: Sadness about the state of the list...

[Andy Goehler]

I feel the same way.

While I can truly comprehend the emotional situation and respect the need to 
voice it I have a hard time not to respond to some of the assumptions made here 
about software design and development, ‘code base’, ‘core’, etc.

Andy


On Mar 09, 2014, at 9:12, Dan Yargici danyarg...@gmail.com wrote:

 I just want to go on the record and say that I've found it really 
 disappointing reading the list over the last week.
 
 It seems that there is quite a number people who are very new to it that have 
 just come here to vent in a totally inappropriate manner that goes against 
 all that this list has been about over the years.  The great signal-to-noise 
 ratio that everyone lauds has completely tipped off the scale into the 
 negative IMO.
 
 I know this is huge news, I know that it feels like a massive kick in the 
 balls and i agree that it's a huge injustice to the software and the people 
 that use and depend on it; but It's telling that so many of the names that 
 made this community (and arguably the software itself) what it is are 
 completely silent or absent from discussions about this.  
 
 It's obvious that people are upset (myself as well, more than you can 
 imagine) but I feel like I'm reading a forum overrun with spambots...  That's 
 my personal reason for being so silent.
 
 The saddest thing would be if we can't keep our community coherent.
 
 DAN

Re: Keep up the noise... (but don't be a dick)

[Andy Goehler]

Well put, I'm convinced this should apply to all of us using whatever software 
to help us achieve what we want. Software as a tool is still very young an 
constantly evolving. Be prepared for change. In some periods for the better, in 
others for the worst.

Andy

 On 08.03.2014, at 21:15, Mirko Jankovic mirkoj.anima...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 People that know only one thing usually gets pretty narrow sight and at one 
 point can't see anything on the sides, when solution to problem is only a 
 look away.
 At the end all what matter is what you do and that you are good in your work.

Re: Maya feature request from Softimage users

[Andy Goehler]

I can’t count the many many times overrides have cost me overtime and 
rerendering because of not working properly.

Andy

On Mar 08, 2014, at 23:02, Greg Punchatz g...@janimation.com wrote:

 I can override ANYTHING in soft... a material to an objects position in 
 space..

Re: Maya feature request from Softimage users

[Andy Goehler]

Thank you for saying that Eric. While Softs Passes/Partitions are still great 
and better than others out there, I feel the same way. Having to add yet 
another object to a partition in x amount of passes is something I’ve become to 
hate. Referencing of partitions/groups in passes would help, expression/rule 
based assignment, or yet a node based approach to passes. Wait what? :-)

Andy


On Mar 08, 2014, at 23:21, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@gmail.com wrote:

 I think we all need to be honest, there were concepts that were great about 
 passes / partitions but there were some things that needed fixing (still do). 
 We need something that isn't exactly like the pass / partition system. We 
 need something better.

Re: Maya feature request from Softimage users

[Andy Goehler]

Sounds great. How does the “Sort Controller” update the pass? By callback upon 
switching to that pass or manually?

Andy

On Mar 08, 2014, at 23:35, Jonah Friedman jon...@gmail.com wrote:

 We have a rule based way of sorting partitions called the Sort Controller, 
 originally conceived by Andy Jones. It's been extremely powerful.
 
 You write your passes in a simple markup language in a PPG on the pass, like 
 this. Copy pasting from a real production scene I have open right now-
 
 Background_Objects_Partition = *
 characters = sg_character
 set = sg_set
 lighting_geo = sg_lighting_geo
 
 l: Background_Lights_Partition = *
 l: env = sg_lEnv
 l: key = sg_lKey
 l: rim = sg_lRim
 
 
 What that does is puts objects in a group called sg_character into a 
 partition called characters. So each pass has a sort controller on it, and 
 the scene can stay sorted by managing the sort groups, called SG by 
 convention. 
 
 It's been extremely good to us. Other than that, passes and partitions do 
 their work exactly the way soft is supposed to, except that the partitions 
 are sorted by the Sort Controller. 
 
 Even our least technical lighters got used to it no problem, and it's 
 universally loved. 

Re: Maya feature request from Softimage users

[Andy Goehler]

On Mar 08, 2014, at 23:47, Jonah Friedman jon...@gmail.com wrote:
 You manually update them by hitting sort or sort all. Also have a check 
 function that checks to see if anything is unsorted and report what.
 
Sounds like something I’ll start implementing on Monday.

Thanks for the inspiration.

Andy