I am trying to recreate the Cinema 4D Helix in Houdini, but have hit a couple of road blocks. The C4D Helix is pretty intuitive and automatically creates good UV's. It allows one to control the height, turns, cross sectional scaling, and caps. It creates polygon groups for the end and rounding part of the caps so that it is easy to texture these parts separately.

I can get somewhat close in Houdini, but I have several issues. I would like to create caps for the ends of the sweep that have group names that are procedurally calculated, so that I don't have to create these manually. The system I used will not work if I change the helix or circle number of points. I would appreciate any suggestions. Thanks.

I think I figured out most of the mistakes. I needed to add a fuse, change uvmapping from point to vertex, and change the group to an expression for last two polygons created. Updated:

It seems to me that perhaps what Houdini needs more of are primitives such as helix?

I think what makes the C4D process easier is that the developers planned on this type of object being a fairly common necessity and implemented an easy path to get the desired results.

I would be all for Houdini having more common primitives.

BTW, have you looked into the Qlib add on? I know there is a spiral tool in there.

http://qlab.github.io/qLib/ [qlab.github.io]

I think the problem is much more fundamental than having more primitives. Compared with working in Maya or C4D, working in Houdini is like programming in Visual C++ compared with Visual Basic. You have to create absolutely everything from scratch. For instance, the sweep, helix, and circle in C4D creates a helix without VEX programming. The sweep adds caps and they caps can be beveled. Groups are assigned to the beveling part as well as each cap automatically. Proper UVs are created based on behind the scene unwrapping the circle. In Houdini, none of this is done.

SideFx is trying to market Houdini to artists who don't want to do a lot of programming. My experience is that you can create production ready renders in C4D, Maya, Modo, etc without programming; but that is impossible to do in Houdini. The benefit of Houdini basically being a mid level programming language is that you have much more control over everythiing, as you have specified yourself how you want everything to work. You hit a ceiling with other programs as they do a lot of stuff behind the scenes that is inaccessible.

It would be good if Houdini added some extra options to their nodes. There are several that allow operators to create groups, and it would not be difficult to have a similar option for the sweep where caps are added and group names given to the beginning and end caps. It would also be nice to have an option for creating reasonable UVs without having to create them yourself with a lot of extra nodes. Similarly, materials get very complicated quick in Houdini and assigning procedural textures is much easier in other programs. One can only hope.

Well, I do like to think that SideFX is moving toward making Houdini more artist friendly (news alert: VEX, python, and having a multitude of nodes for even the simplest of operations isn't). Having said that, some things in Houdini are ridiculously simple while being ridiculously complex in other apps. Until recently, realistic fracturing and debris in C4D was damn near impossible without something like NitroBlast, even even then. Modeling fluids isn't possible at all without something like RealFlow, same is true for explosions without either Turbulence FD or the latest X-Particles. In Houdini, getting incredibly realistic results for those things can be as simple as clicking on one of the shelf tools.

So yes, I do think that SideFX could do a lot by bringing even more commonly used functions as either additional shelf tools, or even better as self-contained single nodes that package much more complex networks within them.

Lately I've been incorporating more and more of the Game Development Toolset into my workflow. This incorrectly-named set of nodes and shelf tools are incredibly useful and I think it's the direction that SideFX should be putting more energy into if it wants to gain popularity with more artists. The Game Development Auto-UV's is simply mind-blowing in efficiency and usefulness without needing to write a single line of code. Check it out:

https://www.sidefx.com/tutorials/houdini-game-dev-tools-auto-uvs/ [www.sidefx.com]

(in comparison, C4D's workflow for UV's seems downright arcane)

Ok, one more (sorry to hijack the thread), this Game Development tool simply blows my mind:

https://youtu.be/hGZqVr5NoTY [youtu.be]

That last is an impressive video. I wonder if Houdini will eventually bundle more example files that have nodes that can be reused for more complicated scenes. The few that are available under the help menu can be quite useful, but basic procedural shaders, UV mapped objects, etc. are limited. Personally, I haven't found anything I can use for real work in Houdini that doesn't require at least a few lines of VEX code and or hscript. I've used Softimage, Maya, Modo, C4D, and sculpting software (zbrush, 3D coat) and there was certainly less/no programming needed for most models.

I needed to model a snake recently and it was very quick and easy in C4D and a pain trying to do that quickly in Houdini. I would agree with you about the limitations of C4D, though. I have some of the Nitro plugins and would use Houdini over any of them for realistic fracturing/explosions. Lacking realflow, I cannot come close to realistic fluids in C4D even with quite complicated shaders and animations. I have looked at x-particles and am not that impressed with the demo videos I've seen. C4D's mograph is great until you need to add a few effectors and then it is actually easier to do in Houdini. For that matter, the procedural operations in C4D hit a ceiling pretty quickly. For instance, creating a tree with branches is not easy in C4D, as the sweep has to be made editable for the first branch and then one loses the ability to go back and change the thickness or curve of the trunk. The same can be said for Modo's newest procedural operators.