I come from a modelling background in VFX for films and tv, I have recently started to learn Houdini mainly for the procedural modelling. I am looking for a way to add deformation to a collection of procedurally generated curves using either black and white masks or coloured (RGB) ID masks.

I would like to be able to do both height displacement, and push points towards or away from a mask. If the masks could also work based on depth if there are layers of curves that would be a bonus. Is it possible to apply a 2d mask to something like a volume that the curves pass through? This may be quite basic, my knowledge is only a couple of weeks old so any suggestions would be really helpful.

I have attached a couple of images to explain better the pushing curve points away from a masked area. I apologise in advance that the images were created using another software but as I said I have been using other software professionally for the last 15 years and it can be hard to break habits.

Hi Loud,

a common way of flowing around objects would be pushing points along volume gradients.

Peter Claes explains this here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgzxBN1m9WE [www.youtube.com]

Another way would be the minpos-VOP-node which finds the closest surface location.

Thanks for both of these, they both look like I can adapt them for my needs. The youtube link is great too and looks like an excellent resource for learning more. Thanks.