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Houdini Engine for Maya » The Houdini Engine for Maya plugin could not be initialized

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BryanRay
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dragonyhr66
shen25748
Hi, thank you for your reply!

I used the launcher to install everything, Houdini 19.5.493 itself and also the plugin. I noticed that it first checks the $HFS variable in the code so I manually added the path to environment variable and it is able to load the plugin now. So somehow the paths I put in the houdini engine preference are not recogonized.


Hello could you be more specific how to modify this??

It's been a while, but since I just ran into the same issue, I thought I'd answer for the benefit of those who come later. You need to edit the file maya.env, which is described here: https://help.autodesk.com/view/MAYAUL/2024/ENU/?guid=GUID-8EFB1AC1-ED7D-4099-9EEE-624097872C04 [help.autodesk.com]

Mine was completely empty, so I just added the line, as described by Bobcat:
HFS = D:\Production\SideFX\Houdini 20.0.625

That's obviously the path to my Houdini install—you'd change it to wherever yours is. Once I'd made that change, Maya loaded the plug-in without complaint.
Edited by BryanRay - March 20, 2024 14:39:29
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Solaris and Karma » SDF_FORMAT_ARGS for binary vs. ascii usds

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BryanRay
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Ah, I see. I should probably defer to the folks who understand USD at a lower level than I do. Although responses may be slow this week due to an event in London.
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Solaris and Karma » SOP import warning message about the imported layer

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BryanRay
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There's not really any such thing as a best place. Put it wherever makes sense for your workflow. Personally, I like to segregate USD from the rest of Houdini's geo, so I stick it in $HIP/usd/…
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Solaris and Karma » SDF_FORMAT_ARGS for binary vs. ascii usds

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BryanRay
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If you don't specify the format in that fashion, then a .usd file will default to saving in binary. If you wish to save in ascii but don't want to break links to .usd files, that's how it's done.
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Solaris and Karma » Hide geo in viewport, but visible in render

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BryanRay
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This is what USD's Payloads system is designed to do. Assuming your assets are configured as payloads, you can use the circled button to load the scene with payloads unloaded. If they've been authored with extentsHints, then they'll show up in the GL viewer as bounding boxes. You can then use the L column in the Scene Graph Tree to determine which prims are loaded in the viewport (regardless of delegate), but all payloads will be rendered by a ROP, regardless of the SGT settings.

In the screenshot, I have only loaded payloads for the cyc, table, and books, but as you can see, sending the render to MPlay shows the entire scene.

You can also use the Load Payloads switch in a Sublayer LOP to prevent payloads in that file from loading regardless of the SGT setting. The L column still functions to load the geometry on demand. And again, unloading the payload in the Sublayer LOP has no effect on the render.
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Solaris and Karma » Read how much primitives are in a solaris node.

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BryanRay
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Some advice I got from goldleaf a while ago has served me well:

Okay so I've found the best way to learn Python and USD is the unit tests on GitHub. For example, here are some tests for Primvars, and Materials:

https://github.com/PixarAnimationStudios/USD/blob/3abc46452b1271df7650e9948fef9f0ce602e3b2/pxr/usd/usdGeom/testenv/testUsdGeomPrimvar.py#L512 [github.com]

https://github.com/PixarAnimationStudios/USD/blob/v22.11/pxr/usd/usdShade/testenv/testUsdShadeBinding.py [github.com]

I like to search for things on Github, and filter for the Python language; most of the time points me to a unit test in Python that shows how to do something.
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Solaris and Karma » Karma - Outputting a render log with render stats

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BryanRay
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Look in the USD Render ROP instead. In the Husk / Statistics tab.
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Solaris and Karma » Output Processor order

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BryanRay
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I've noticed the same. I believe the processors get executed in the order they appear in the parameters, and they're not aware of one another. So if Use Relative Paths is first, it sets the paths, then Copy All Assets uses that path, which is the one now stored in the usd file, as the target for the copy, but they're already in that location.
Edited by BryanRay - April 12, 2023 13:33:30
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Technical Discussion » Color Concave area of mesh

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BryanRay
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You're using the dot product between the normal and the Y axis, so this will select everything that isn't pointed upward. Useful in its own way, but not what you need. I'm not sure what the actual solution in VEX would be--it's not an easy problem, from what I can tell. There is, however, a Measure Curvature tool in Labs that might give you what you want.
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Solaris and Karma » How to utilize Component Builder extra layer

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BryanRay
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The extra layer will be expressed in the Scene Graph as another descendant of the asset. For instance, if you had 'light1' in your extra layer, then your component output (assuming otherwise default configuration) should have descendants called 'geo', 'mtl', and 'light1'. You could control the light using a Prune, Light Edit, or Light Mixer, just like any other primitive.

Knowing the standard prim path outputs, you could build a primitive pattern to select the extra layers. For instance:
/componentoutput1/* ^(/componentoutput1/geo /componentoutput1/mtl)

That selects everything under /componentoutput1 except for 'geo' and 'mtl'.
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Solaris and Karma » Materialx displacement shader error

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BryanRay
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I don't think there's a way to do that, no. Like most warnings, its purpose is to alert you that there's something wonky. If it's annoying you, then I think the right move would be to fix the shaders, not to disable the warning.
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Solaris and Karma » Materialx displacement shader error

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BryanRay
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Do you have anything plugged into the Displacement shader? The warning is telling you that the shader isn't doing anything, so it's being skipped for efficiency purposes. A Karma MtlX Subnet automatically creates a MtlX Displacement node and connects it to displacement_output. If you leave it in the network but don't actually use it, then you'll get this warning.
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Solaris and Karma » Single layer exr's

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BryanRay
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There are other reasons to prefer a discrete file per AOV. If you don't want to archive AOVs that didn't contribute to the final comp, for instance. Or if you sometimes find yourself in a situation where you'd like to version up only a portion of the render.
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Solaris and Karma » materialx in Solaris - bad normals?

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BryanRay
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Are you using normal maps? I was having a similar problem at first and found that my problem was that I had forgotten to set the Signature in my Image nodes to Vector, so Karma was assuming the normals were sRGB and 'helpfully' linearizing them for me.
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Solaris and Karma » Sopimport: toggle Load from disk vs. import from sops

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BryanRay
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ikoon
Please, from a "one man, one .hiplc" perspective, what would be an ideal way to toggle Sopimport's Load from disk versus import "live" from sops?

The attached solution, is it a right way to do the toggle?

Seems like a reasonable solution, yes, if you need to keep the option of switching back to the SOP Import available. If there is more than one such switch, I might add a Context Option (https://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/ref/contextoptions.html) in order to switch them all at once with a single control.

Also, can the Sopimport`s Layer Save Path be written to disk without downstream USD ROP?

There's no internal save mechanism in the SOP Import—it requires a USD ROP at some point if you want to put the USD to disk. You don't necessarily need to branch it off, though. As long as there is no Layer Break between the SOP Import and the USD ROP at the bottom of the tree, the Crag layer will be saved when that ROP cooks. That said, I'd probably leave the ROPs as they are but put a Layer Break right below the Switch so as to avoid re-saving that data unnecessarily.
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Solaris and Karma » Karma Point Light Radius Setting and Attenuation Not Working

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BryanRay
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I couldn't say with regard to the volume. Only way to know would be to test it.

You can definitely connect multiple filters to a single light. The filters will be multiplicative with one another. You'll assign the entire filter library to the light, and any filter that has its orange flag set will be active.

Repeated for emphasis, though: Customized filters constructed from MaterialX nodes will not currently work for Karma XPU. It only supports the three default filters (gel, gobo, barn doors).
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Solaris and Karma » How to use the new component variant number mode?

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BryanRay
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There are likely thousands of ways the context option can be applied. Just because I don't mention one specific application doesn't mean that it's impossible. Here's another example, this time with @GEOMETRYVARIANTINDEX controlling which rock is being imported to the Component Geometry node from the /obj network.
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Solaris and Karma » Karma Point Light Radius Setting and Attenuation Not Working

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BryanRay
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That went quicker than I'd expected.

Play with the Inhigh value in mtlxrange1 inside the Light Filter Library.
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Solaris and Karma » Karma Point Light Radius Setting and Attenuation Not Working

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BryanRay
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The Attenuation controls may be bugged. I logged that one earlier today. Right below those, though, is an Active Radius control that does work and may meet your needs.


Alternately, if you're using Karma CPU, you could use a Light Filter to perform an attenuation. I don't have an example right on hand at the moment, but I can probably come up with one with a little time.
Edited by BryanRay - Oct. 21, 2022 18:15:20
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Solaris and Karma » Karma filtering issue

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BryanRay
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I just came out of a meeting with the rendering folks, and they said that the pixel filters aren't implemented in Karma XPU at all. But do note that XPU is still beta. Karma CPU behaves as described in the docs—you can specify a non-antialiased depth AOV using your choice of the min or max sample at each pixel. Edge mode appears to fall back to Average.

I'll submit a ticket to have the docs updated to indicate that XPU does not support the pixel filters at this time.
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