Hello Labsters!
It’s been another busy month for the Labs team, with a handful of new tools, workflow improvements, and performance updates making their way into the latest production build. Let’s take a look at what’s new.
New Tools
Generates a grid of points in 3D space. The grid can be defined using either a single uniform size or independent dimensions along each axis. Unlike the standard Grid SOP, this node outputs points only and supports three-dimensional point layouts.
Generates procedural textures for checking UV layouts, texture orientation, texel density, and distortion. You can adjust the generated texture with tile colours, markers, outlines, and text labels. The image can be saved to disk or viewed with the updated Labs UV Visualize SOP, which projects it onto geometry to examine UV layouts, orientation, distortion, seams, and island arrangement.
Tool Updates
Visualization textures can now be generated procedurally using the new Labs UV Grid Texture COP.
Added a new menu to set the target texel density, either by entering a direct value or by computing it from texture resolution, length, and unit.
Now includes the complete library of modeled plant assets and presets. Every supported biome now ships with its own collection of ready-to-use plant definitions, making it much easier to begin populating environments without additional setup.
Scatter generation is now up to twice as fast, with improved placement that allows shrubs to grow beneath dense tree canopies. Labs Biome Configure and Labs Biome Configure Multibiomes recipes have also been updated to use the latest biome tools.
Retiring the Labs OCIO ACES Profile & Labs Alternative Grey Viewport Background
Before Houdini introduced support for these two features, the Labs team implemented our own versions to help bridge the gap that users were missing. Now that these features have been included with native Houdini since version 20.0, we are phasing out these options in Labs, though they have served us well.
If you have them enabled in your Labs settings in versions 20 - 21, you may be seeing a pop-up warning. To disable them, navigate to Labs → Labs Add-ons, and toggle both options off. They are disabled by default in versions 22 and above.
The Labs OCIO ACES Profile is replaced by native Houdini profile management, which can be found under Edit → OCIO Settings.
The Labs Alternative Grey Viewport Background was an override for the Grey viewport background option designed to make it darker, but now Houdini comes standard with a Dark Grey viewport background option, and the Labs override is no longer necessary.
Roadmap
As always, the Public Roadmap continues to evolve based on your feedback. If there’s a tool or workflow you’d like to see in Labs, let us know through the website form or Discord.
Proposed Items
Export Landscape SOP
In Progress
Reload Python Modules UTL
Delete Mismatched Attributes and Groups SOP
Node of the Month
Labs Delete Small Parts removes disconnected pieces of geometry based on their size, making it quick and easy to tidy up scans, simulations, and imported assets.
Contact Us
We love seeing what you’re building with Labs and we’ll keep sharing our findings. If you’re working on something cool, please contact us and share it. The best way to reach out is through Discord. Our official SideFX server is public, and we’re there too.
See you next month — stay creative!
SideFX Labs
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