Here's another one from me learning Houdini…

http://www.elementvfx.com/WebDemo/h95_hardbody_01_h264.mov [elementvfx.com]

I like how stable the dynamics are, they tend to just work.

Nice.

BTW, you probably don't care but I noticed that the watermark logo had weird colors so it looks like you did some color correction afterwards. Just wanted to point out that one can avoid this if it was rendered out to Houdini's proprietary non-commercial image format, .picnc , which has no watermark. That way, color correction can be done in Houdini's compositing networks before saving it out in some non-proprietary image format, at which point the watermark gets burned in.

Bah, If I'm that interested in getting rid of the watermark I'll shell out for the HD version.

Side Effects are going to have to suck up my change to their logo colors.

I said you probably don't care.

You were right!

I'm totally digging Houdini. I do wish its was faster at a few things…. Cloth, Rendering…

Mike_RB
You were right!

I'm totally digging Houdini. I do wish its was faster at a few things…. Cloth, Rendering…

Gosh, I hear it often and can't believe what I hear. Mantra is fast, very fast. Couple of companies have jumped recently into Houdini mainly because of that reason. Fast, stable and affordable solution. Once you know how to use it, you will enjoy its power and speed.

I've never heard that PRMan is slow although is as slow as Mantra. Yes, I saw how Modo or mental ray pretend to be fast with GUI interactivity. Well, interactivity doesn't equal speed. I also know couple of projects started in mental ray which had to abandon it due to a serious performance problems in hard rendering.

Mantra doesn't have decent and easy to use GI solution though this is quite common for renderer of its kind (production, micropoly engines). Agree. Mantra doesn't have also any learning materials you could use to prepare your self to work with it. Agree, its a big shame.

I might make a quick video in modo, showing setting up a few objects, a light. simple surfacing (clay, plastic, glass, chrome, blurry reflective metal), and some GI. Then maybe one of you Houdini wizards could somewhat replicate it in Houdini. That would give people like me a bit of a rosetta stone intro vid so we might feel more comfortable with getting renders going in Houdini…

Hello Mike,
Nice to see an old lw/messiah/modo user here!
Houdini is a real joy and a great learning experience.

Mike_RB
Then maybe one of you Houdini wizards could somewhat replicate it in Houdini.

Hi Mike!

That would be great idea (if someone want to participate). My experience is based on LightWave and I am also struggling with Mantra, but I can also say that I am discovering something new almost on daily basis. Right now I am experimenting with light templates (radiosity effect) and PBR rendering. Not as easy to setup as LW, but I think that effects would be worth learning.

Kamil.