Thank you to all who responded. I may have shamed some of you into it, but as someone who’s self taught in all the programs I use professionally (Solidworks, Illustrator, Manga Studio to name a few) and who has taught college students to use both Illustrator and Vellum, I know the incredible value of being able to ask a living person for guidance. Think of yourselves as Houdini Sherpas. I plan on climbing Everest (Houdini) myself, but even getting guidance on what to pack before I get there is of great value. Yes, the guides and videos are terrific, but as my students would say, “if I don’t even know what words are being used to describe what I want, how am I to look it up?”
And as basic as my questions are, the resolutions are not as simple as they might seem. After all, I can key frame rotational positions and generate an expression to create spin, but as soon as I start smoothing transitions out in the channel editor, the functions become Bezier curves(functions) and I no longer have my RPM formulas at the key frames. Clearly I need to figure out how to have a constant slope, with an RPM formula and on either side have ease in/ease out Beziers. I’ll eventually figure that out, but clearly I’m already in deep math waters…so not so basic after all.
For the moment I’ll table the RPM problem in favor of seeing if I can apply Peter Quinn’s Wine Spill methodology to get my liquid swirling in the glass. Hopefully I won’t make as many mistakes setting that up! So many ways to go wrong!
Anyway, thanks again to those who pointed me in a direction (or at least confirmed I was heading the right way) and please be patient with us new users. You all started at the beginning at some point and this particular program isn’t the best for self instruction.
-GW
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Houdini Indie and Apprentice » Noobie whats to spin at 250 RPM!
- Horseguy44
- 6 posts
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Technical Discussion » Solidworks to Houdini - Converting Geometry etc.
- Horseguy44
- 6 posts
- Offline
Looks great Stu but I have to ask, considering pretty renders can be done with other less powerful/less difficult packages, why Houdini? Are there plans to take this iron or other products and animate? Add steam/smoke etc?
This does give me great hopes that my own ambitions for Houdini, as a product design tool (this is a hint to the developers…new/existing market waiting to be accommodated…) will work out!
Thanks for the update.
-GW
This does give me great hopes that my own ambitions for Houdini, as a product design tool (this is a hint to the developers…new/existing market waiting to be accommodated…) will work out!
Thanks for the update.
-GW
Houdini Indie and Apprentice » Noobie whats to spin at 250 RPM!
- Horseguy44
- 6 posts
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Huh, I was hoping for a more active (friendly?) community…
Even someone saying, “hey Noofus (that's Noobie and Dufus combined) try looking at so and so's tutorial or so and so's video.” would have been nice.
I'm not looking for THE answer, just direction.
So far I've found that inputting $F into rotation generates spin, and of course I can increase or decrease by multiplying it, but the spin starts from frame one no matter which frame I put his expression in. Need to be able to spin it up and then back down.
Thoughts? (anyone anyone?)
-GW
Even someone saying, “hey Noofus (that's Noobie and Dufus combined) try looking at so and so's tutorial or so and so's video.” would have been nice.
I'm not looking for THE answer, just direction.
So far I've found that inputting $F into rotation generates spin, and of course I can increase or decrease by multiplying it, but the spin starts from frame one no matter which frame I put his expression in. Need to be able to spin it up and then back down.
Thoughts? (anyone anyone?)
-GW
Technical Discussion » Solidworks to Houdini - Converting Geometry etc.
- Horseguy44
- 6 posts
- Offline
Stu;
Wow, that is wild!
I'm actually very much in the same boat as you…just dipping into Houdini, but I've not come across this issue. I've not tried applying bump maps yet either though, but I have added “noise” to a glass material and the results have been good.
I also did not output triangles when I tessellated my export. I used N-gons which came into Houdini just fine and have yielded (so far) smooth rendered results with glass and “clay” materials.
Let me know how you got to this picture and I'll see if I can get similar results. (Us Solidworks folks got to stick together!)
-GW
Wow, that is wild!
I'm actually very much in the same boat as you…just dipping into Houdini, but I've not come across this issue. I've not tried applying bump maps yet either though, but I have added “noise” to a glass material and the results have been good.
I also did not output triangles when I tessellated my export. I used N-gons which came into Houdini just fine and have yielded (so far) smooth rendered results with glass and “clay” materials.
Let me know how you got to this picture and I'll see if I can get similar results. (Us Solidworks folks got to stick together!)
-GW
Houdini Indie and Apprentice » Noobie whats to spin at 250 RPM!
- Horseguy44
- 6 posts
- Offline
Hey All,
I’m probably diving into the deep end too soon, but all of Houdini so far feels like the deep end, so why not?
(Note: I’m coming at this from a Product Design using Solidworks direction, my training as an Industrial Designer merges Art and Engineering but involves no IT or programming knowledge whatsoever. As such, it feels like I’m attempting to learn to fly a plane by sitting in the cockpit of a 747 and all the controls are labeled in Latin. The multiple references to helping “artists” in the literature makes me laugh and remember the horror in the eyes of some of my fellow student when told they’d need to use math when learning to draft perspective views. Ah the bad old days. But I digress.)
So while I struggle to learn Latin (i.e. nodes and expressions and what CHOP VOP and SOP etc. acronyms stand for) and work my way through the really basic tutorials (hooray, I’ve managed to import geometry and assign materials!) I thought I’d pick the brains of live people, because frankly searching the online manual and reading the forum posts hasn’t been as helpful as I’d hoped.
So the project is to demonstrate liquid being swirled around in a vessel (like a drinking glass) spinning at 250 rpm.
The liquid simulation part is what got me excited to try Houdini in the first place as other “rendering” packages can offer basic movements of parts, but can’t actually change the shape of any geometry. What is odd, is that I can’t find what I’d think of as a simple function: rotate/revolve at X-rpm. Shouldn’t this be simple? Don’t even know where to start! It almost seems like setting up the container and letting the software figure out the turbulence of the liquid in it is better spelled out in various tutorials and videos than this basic function is.
Is spinning something just so stupid and basic that no one thinks to cover it as a topic?
Please help. Thanks.
-GW
I’m probably diving into the deep end too soon, but all of Houdini so far feels like the deep end, so why not?
(Note: I’m coming at this from a Product Design using Solidworks direction, my training as an Industrial Designer merges Art and Engineering but involves no IT or programming knowledge whatsoever. As such, it feels like I’m attempting to learn to fly a plane by sitting in the cockpit of a 747 and all the controls are labeled in Latin. The multiple references to helping “artists” in the literature makes me laugh and remember the horror in the eyes of some of my fellow student when told they’d need to use math when learning to draft perspective views. Ah the bad old days. But I digress.)
So while I struggle to learn Latin (i.e. nodes and expressions and what CHOP VOP and SOP etc. acronyms stand for) and work my way through the really basic tutorials (hooray, I’ve managed to import geometry and assign materials!) I thought I’d pick the brains of live people, because frankly searching the online manual and reading the forum posts hasn’t been as helpful as I’d hoped.
So the project is to demonstrate liquid being swirled around in a vessel (like a drinking glass) spinning at 250 rpm.
The liquid simulation part is what got me excited to try Houdini in the first place as other “rendering” packages can offer basic movements of parts, but can’t actually change the shape of any geometry. What is odd, is that I can’t find what I’d think of as a simple function: rotate/revolve at X-rpm. Shouldn’t this be simple? Don’t even know where to start! It almost seems like setting up the container and letting the software figure out the turbulence of the liquid in it is better spelled out in various tutorials and videos than this basic function is.
Is spinning something just so stupid and basic that no one thinks to cover it as a topic?
Please help. Thanks.
-GW
Technical Discussion » Solidworks to Houdini - Converting Geometry etc.
- Horseguy44
- 6 posts
- Offline
Pete, I've just started exploring the use of Houdini along side Solidworks and have an effective (though not free) solution.
Check out Moment of Inspiration (http://moi3d.com/). [moi3d.com] It is a former Rhino programmer who decided he could do a better (simpler) job of nurb modeling system…and I'd have to agree.
Where MOI comes in is that you can bring .step files into MOI without errors in surfaces etc (at least I've yet to have any) delete anything you didn't want as well as other manipulation as necessary and then export to FBX (I tried OBJ but every part came in as a single geometry). The magic is that you can adjust, with full on screen preview, how the surfaces are carved into polygons with several very powerful options.
It has worked great for me and gives you a very nice nurbs based modeler on top of it…and I think it is cheaper than PolyTrans (though I'm not certain).
Hope this helps.
-GW
Check out Moment of Inspiration (http://moi3d.com/). [moi3d.com] It is a former Rhino programmer who decided he could do a better (simpler) job of nurb modeling system…and I'd have to agree.
Where MOI comes in is that you can bring .step files into MOI without errors in surfaces etc (at least I've yet to have any) delete anything you didn't want as well as other manipulation as necessary and then export to FBX (I tried OBJ but every part came in as a single geometry). The magic is that you can adjust, with full on screen preview, how the surfaces are carved into polygons with several very powerful options.
It has worked great for me and gives you a very nice nurbs based modeler on top of it…and I think it is cheaper than PolyTrans (though I'm not certain).
Hope this helps.
-GW
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