I really like the idea of Houdini as the hub for lighting. Considering most FX are now done in Houdini anyway, it sort of houses two rather complex aspects of CG really nicely.
ROPs isn't really a pass system but think of it more like separable render globals for all outputs. Probably one of the least touted feature of Houdini but definitely one of the most luxurious feature set. You can pick and choose to your hearts desire what can be done via AOVs, what grouping of ROPs you want to use, and what should be overidden via Takes (though usually shyed away from). We've had Maya guys migrate over feeling really bummed having to go back to Maya's pass system. -Lu On Wed, May 21, 2014 at 1:25 PM, Francois Lord <flordli...@gmail.com> 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 <flordli...@gmail.com> 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? >>> >> >
