Hello all. I was recently arguing with a friend of mine about Houdini being used for lighting at big studios. When I have talked to lighters from various studios, they all have said that for lighting they use in house rendering softwares, and other software programs such as Arnold, Renderman, and Katana, and not Houdini. However my friend countered that studios such as Pixar use Houdini for lighting. I was just wondering if Houdini is used for lighting at any major studios? I do know Houdini is used for effects and shading in several studios. I am just wondering specifically about lighting.

I can't give you current specifics - I don't know and even if I did I couldn't say

but I've worked on a number of feature animated films, animated TV series and VFX TV series that have used Houdini in some fashion for lighting.

one thing that might be confusing the issue is that Houdini can be used for lighting in a few ways
1 - light in Houdini and render in Mantra - Houdini's built-in render engine
2 - light in Houdini but render in a 3rd party render engine (PRman, Arnold, VRay, etc etc)
3 - light the VFX stuff (volumes, RBD, fluids) and render in Mantra, and render everything else in a 3rd party engine - in Houdini
4 - light the VFX stuff (volumes, RBD, fluids) and render in Mantra, and render everything else in a 3rd party engine - in some other application

so the reality is that if you're talking about “Houdini for lighting”, the answer is usually some combination of the above.

Note: Katana is a lighting application that ONLY uses 3rd party render engines (PRman, Arnold etc)

Ive worked on quite a few shows where Houdini has been used for lighting, but as ever things change all the time and it depends on the show and what the team want to use.

Rob

Are Material StyleSheets exposed for 3rd Party Rendering in Houdini or is just Mantra feature?

Axis uses only houdini and mantra for rendering/lighting.

https://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3080&Itemid=68 [sidefx.com]

The Houdini/Mantra combo was used quite often for lighting/rendering by the commercials division of Framestore when I was there.

we used houdini/mantra to make the book of life , now a friend of mine in China is setting up to make an animated feature in houidni/mantra

every single test I have done in a comparison test against another popular renderer proved to be +/-5%, but only one of the renderers being flexible….and not 1500 per seat

mantra makes the most sense for a smaller studio on a budget, imho

Holly Showalter
Pixar use Houdini for lighting.

Where did they hear this? If they do it's most likely in a limited capacity (test renders and such, most likely for the fx guys). When I was there they used their own propriety software for lighting, and Blue Umbrella was the first short they made using Katana for the lighting package. Things could have changed by now (it's been a few years), but I don't think they switched to Houdini as their lighting package… but I could be wrong.

Method Studios used Mantra for San Andreas. Some other projects are being done fully in Matnra as far as I know, but other films there in the past were often done with Houdini / Mantra for fx stuff (volumes especially), but geometry was often sent to Maya for rendering.

From what I've seen, people with experience lighting in either Maya or Houdini almost always would prefer to light with Houdini. A lot of studios will use it for jobs that require things like feathers, FX, even fur.

But if you are a studio, you have to consider the way things currently are, which normally means A: finding lighters with Houdini experience is difficult, B: lighting pipelines take time to adapt to a new package, and C: Houdini is not usually the cheapest option.

Its used, pretty much to some degree by most major studios I'd say, but not as the sole solution.

I've lit and rendered stuff in Houdini/Mantra at Framestore, DD, Sony, Double Negative and ILM that have gone into the final shot. Although almost all of these things were fx elements.

It's true that many studios don't use Houdini/Mantra in their lighting dept as the main basis of lighting and rendering on big shows, but many fx departments do, and fx is more or less the only other department that regularly renders is own stuff. So I guess you're both right in a way, the main bulk of the rendering on big shows is rarely done in Houdini (apart from at Houdini only studios), but some rendering is usually done in Mantra, in the form of fx elements.