I do miss XSI passes a bit… The thing as you know is that there is no the concept of passes, you can mimic it although not 100% so people just find their approach and become very proud of it not knowing XSI has the very finest system since day 1.
I never use takes for passes but for overrides and use ROPs together with bundles instead of explicit references of "object merge" style approaches. The thing I am not sure i want to give up now is the approach of ROP networks dependencies so I can trigger very complex setups and simply go home. ;-) Jordi Bares [email protected] On 21 May 2014, at 22:51, Andy Nicholas <[email protected]> wrote: > Sure, conventions are always necessary, but more so with Houdini. Some people > use Takes as passes, others use ROPs with object masks into subnets as passes. > Or you could use a mix of the two approaches. > > > At least in Soft, passes are passes! > > > A > > > > > On 21 May 2014 at 22:16 Jordi Bares <[email protected]> wrote: > >> It is the same with any package the only thing is that Houdini artists tend >> to >> be more of a peculiar type… you just have to make sure they stick to the >> conventions like all Softimage users do (for example on how we setup passes) >> >> Jordi Bares >> [email protected] >> >> On 21 May 2014, at 22:12, Andy Nicholas <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>> Sure. There's certainly a lot of potential there. It's just that the >>> openness >>> means that the workflow is very open to interpretation. Houdini's a bit like >>> coding, everyone has their own style so you can get in a mess. It's very >>> easy to >>> add in quick little "fixes" which other people might look on as hacks >>> instead. >>> >>> A >>> >>> >>> On 21 May 2014 at 21:25 Francois Lord <[email protected]> wrote: >>> >>>> And how would it fare as a lighting/shading/rendering hub? >>>> I'm very hesitant to move to Maya just for it's lack of a true a pass >>>> system. But then, there's only Houdini and Katana. We could add to the >>>> list Modo and Clarisse (which I'm surprised nobody talked about here >>>> yet) but we need Arnold. >>>> >>>> On 21-May-14 15:55, Andy Nicholas wrote: >>>>> From my experience, it's still relatively slow. A lot of stuff is still >>>>> single >>>>> threaded although they've done a lot of work to improve that recently. Be >>>>> ready >>>>> to eat up a lot of disk space too, as you'll be caching stuff out all the >>>>> time >>>>> to make up for the lack of speed. >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Despite what many say about Houdini being great for particles, compared to >>>>> ICE, >>>>> the particles workflow is bloody awful. The nodes are super basic which >>>>> means >>>>> you have to roll your own out of VOPs, which are then super slow. ICE and >>>>> Arnold >>>>> are a dream for instancing, but Houdini drives me insane with slow and >>>>> flaky >>>>> workflows (although I probably need to update my knowledge since some of >>>>> the >>>>> new >>>>> features have come out - e.g. packed primitives). >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Generally in production, expect not to see any significant results out of >>>>> Houdini artists for the first 70-80% of the job. That can be a real pain >>>>> for >>>>> working with needy clients. Once you get past that point though, they'll >>>>> be >>>>> able >>>>> to turn new versions out very quickly. Unfortunately, if it doesn't look >>>>> good at >>>>> that point you've got a crap load of work to redo, and it can really bite >>>>> you in >>>>> the ass if you don't have a good backup plan. >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> When it comes to commercials, not a lot beats ICE and it's rigid body >>>>> implementation for speed and ease of use, and I really miss not having >>>>> that >>>>> in >>>>> Houdini. Doing simple stuff in Houdini's DOPs can require an hour of >>>>> research >>>>> trying to find out what data you need to modify, and how to actually >>>>> implement >>>>> it. >>>>> >>>>> I could go on a lot longer, but all I'll say is that you have to be super >>>>> careful when you decide to throw a job at Houdini. Make sure you have R&D >>>>> time >>>>> built in if you haven't done a particular effect before. >>>>> >>>>> A >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> On 21 May 2014 at 19:42 Francois Lord <[email protected]> wrote: >>>>> >>>>>> So... >>>>>> What are houdini weaknesses? What is missing in Houdini compared to >>>>>> Softimage? Would you run a company only using Houdini as 3D app? Why not? >>>> >>
