Even though there wasn't much in the terms of Rendering feature updates, the tease at the end of the launch event mentioning LOPs is real intriguing. I'm sure SideFX will do a stellar job once its released, so a lot to look forward to.
Everything else got a nice update and H17 will be a again a release that pulls in more users in my opinion.
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Houdini Lounge » Houdini 17 reactions and thoughts
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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Houdini Lounge » Thoughts on mantra
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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I will just say that on a show I was previously part of we had 2x better render times (mantra) than current one (vray), with comparable look and complexity. The difference is one had senior artists setting up everything and using cheats wherever possible, while the current one is vray with basic setup + GI. GI in Mantra is not currently its best selling point. I'm quite sure SideFX is looking into this for upcoming release as major Mantra developments were in quite a few releases back. Also LOPs [forums.odforce.net], if its true they are Lighting operators and it moves Houdini+Mantra into Katana territory, the future is bright (GI added).
Houdini Lounge » Vex Foreach Loop issue
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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You are iterating across all primitives and then in a foreach loop over all primitives in a group each time. So for each primitive you are setting it to 1 exactly N times of the length of the group array. I would think thats not what you are trying to do
. Rethink logic, or do everything in a detail wrangle to run only once.

Technical Discussion » Instance Animation Time
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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Cache and offset into the frame number. Sadly I don't think there is a better solution.
Houdini Indie and Apprentice » OpenGL ROP control display of nulls
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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Technical Discussion » Surface Model Shader: Setting up normal map
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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Technical Discussion » Setting Parameter Spreadsheet through python
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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If you are on 15.5 or higher, there is a way to manipulate Houdini QT interface through hou.ui.mainQtWindow() which returns main window QWidget. You have access to all the descendants from there. I think it may be a bit of a hacky way to do it, but it should work. From the docs it seems it was only meant as means to attach your custom interfaces to main window, but I tried calling methods on children and it seems to work fine.
Houdini Learning Materials » Procedural grouping (grouping leafs of a tree)
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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Here is one way to do it. As long as the leaves are only features with two connected primitives.
SI Users » Node Export/Import
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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I usually use something like this to save out selected nodes:
There is also an companion of hou.Node.loadChildrenFromFile(). Also copy paste across houdini instances basically does the same thing. Check out your tmp folder when you do CTRL-C. There should be OBJ_copy.cpio there if you copy from obj context, same for others (OUT etc.).
Also its good to know that hip and hda are also cpio archives for the most part and can be manipulated with cpio (listed, extracted, inserted).
import hou sel = hou.selectedNodes() filename = "nodes.cpio" contextnode = hou.node('/obj') # change to the parent of the selected nodes or you could use sel[0].parent() contextnode.saveChildrenToFile(sel, [], filename) # here the empty brackets are a empty list of networkboxes, populate if needed
There is also an companion of hou.Node.loadChildrenFromFile(). Also copy paste across houdini instances basically does the same thing. Check out your tmp folder when you do CTRL-C. There should be OBJ_copy.cpio there if you copy from obj context, same for others (OUT etc.).
Also its good to know that hip and hda are also cpio archives for the most part and can be manipulated with cpio (listed, extracted, inserted).
Edited by el_diablo - 2016年12月12日 14:53:28
Technical Discussion » Python: Set Current HDA Definition
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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I haven't tried but if you set preferred and then force sync, maybe you'll get the version right. Also https://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/hom/hou/Node [sidefx.com] , syncNodeVersionIfNeeded(version) might do the trick.
Edited by el_diablo - 2016年11月30日 05:57:46
Technical Discussion » BBOX Conform to changes ?
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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Not quite sure how are you attempting to match the bounds, but I attached one way (probably not the best one) to match obj A (sphere) to obj B (cube) bounds. It takes into consideration sop level bbox and multiplies it with obj level scale and sx,sy,sz. It also matches the position of obj A to the centroid of obj B.
Edited by el_diablo - 2016年11月15日 10:03:52
Houdini Lounge » Distributed IPR in Houdini
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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What kind of licenses are needed? Can one Houdini (Escape) license server multiple render clients with mantra -H?
Technical Discussion » Merging a part of a hip to the current session
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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Yea I too use two or more sessions from time to time.
However now I'm trying to find a way to merge only parameters or some nodes from different hip files on disc. I know I could expand them and pull out stuff as strings but I'm trying to skip that step if possible and access them the same way we are able to access HDAs.
I did have some luck with node.saveChildrenToFile and loadChildrenFromFile, but this still needs a additional file on disc which is what I'm trying to avoid.
However now I'm trying to find a way to merge only parameters or some nodes from different hip files on disc. I know I could expand them and pull out stuff as strings but I'm trying to skip that step if possible and access them the same way we are able to access HDAs.
I did have some luck with node.saveChildrenToFile and loadChildrenFromFile, but this still needs a additional file on disc which is what I'm trying to avoid.
Technical Discussion » Merging a part of a hip to the current session
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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I'm looking into a way to merge parts of files into currently open files. I know about the merge from python and hscript but its pretty limited in the pattern only referencing names. It would be great to get some way of traversing hips the same way there is for installed HDAs. Any tips on the subject?
Houdini Lounge » Modeling Toolbox
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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You had me going there for a while…
I been looking up H Indie limitations on the website.
I been looking up H Indie limitations on the website.

Technical Discussion » Who is going to fix this issue?
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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Actually this even happens on Linux Centos 7.1/H14.0.441 with Quadro K2200. Haven't tested out 15 yet.
Houdini Lounge » Modeling Toolbox
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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Looks really nice, but what file format is used in exchange between Blender and Houdini in your tools?
Technical Discussion » expand/hcollapse limitations?
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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Houdini Lounge » How to remove the default render pass?Op_Id and Prim_Id
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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Is there a way to get lights with influence for the object at pixel clicked? I guess you could use .objectNode and try to get throught the lights masks at object and render level, but I'm thinking more in line of the light linker functionality. I found hou.LightLinkerPane but it seems not implemented yet?
Technical Discussion » expand/hcollapse limitations?
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- el_diablo
- 133 posts
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This I get back from stat
File: ‘foo.txt’
Size: 12 Blocks: 8 IO Block: 4096 regular file
Device: fd02h/64770d Inode: 134459845 Links: 1
Access: (0666/-rw-rw-rw-) Uid: (16777218/user)
Gid: (16777216\domain users)
Context: unconfined_u
bject_r:user_home_t:s0
Access: 2015-09-30 19:06:33.480448865 +0200
Modify: 2015-09-30 19:06:18.714266400 +0200
Change: 2015-09-30 19:06:18.714266400 +0200
Birth: -
BTW, thanks for your help!
File: ‘foo.txt’
Size: 12 Blocks: 8 IO Block: 4096 regular file
Device: fd02h/64770d Inode: 134459845 Links: 1
Access: (0666/-rw-rw-rw-) Uid: (16777218/user)
Gid: (16777216\domain users)
Context: unconfined_u

Access: 2015-09-30 19:06:33.480448865 +0200
Modify: 2015-09-30 19:06:18.714266400 +0200
Change: 2015-09-30 19:06:18.714266400 +0200
Birth: -
BTW, thanks for your help!
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