I am not e expert in LOP's Instance but i have made a Example that works.
There are 2 ways how to instance in USD and more then one way how to load the the data in to LOP's.


Documentation
About Instancing in LOP's (Solaris):
https://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/solaris/usd.html#instancing [www.sidefx.com]
LOP Instancer:
https://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/nodes/lop/instancer.html [www.sidefx.com]
LOP Translator plugin (expert level):
https://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/hom/sceneimport_object_translator.html [www.sidefx.com]

HGaal
The modeler is very good. But it's expensive for just playing around.
Modeling is the most important part of 3d. All these booleans, subdivides, and so on are very good in Houdini. I once did some simple things at the same time in a blender and Houdini. The polygonal grid in houdini after all Booleans and subdivide is better and more correct than in blender, where it sometimes broke strangely. (But why does the subdivide work so slowly?! 50-100 times slower than in a blender ). Plus interesting functions for working with curves that are not in the blender. Even the whole idea is based on attributes - beginners learn this through modeling. Therefore, uncomfortable modeling in Houdini repels newcomers. Only the olds argue that modeling is not necessary. And it turns out that Houdini was created by the Olds for the Olds. This is a 100% guarantee of the extinction of the product. I have sold many products and worked in different companies and have seen many partner companies. Everywhere in a successful business, the same scheme is the need for growth and attracting new buyers / users of the product. But I see that the voices of the olds require Houdini to encapsulate in a narrow niche, pushing away newcomers. As a seller, I will say that this is the way of vegetating. The whole new generation knows the blender, but does not know Houdini. Why? People, if there are alternatives, always choose convenience. The Olds will leave and a new generation is coming to replace them. And? But Houdini is filled with amazing algorithms and the work of many brilliant people. Do we want it to gather dust in the corner and people didn't use it? No. Therefore, we are waiting for a new version every time and hope for a new viewport .

Subdivision difference
The Subdivision Lib is the same (OpenSubdiv) but the implementations is different how it gets used.
in blender when you add the subdivision modifier you get a quick responds and when you put it on Level 10 (as example) it is far faster as in houdini. but on edit mode you get the low res mesh and not the subdivided mesh, to get the subdivided mesh you have to apply it. when you do that it will take some time in blender and the speed difference is far smaller or even equal when you add both processing's.
(there is also the Multiresolution Modifier but it is similar)
in houdini it is different the subdivided node gives the final mesh and not a display based only mesh as blender does.
there is a option in the OBJ node to display (Geometry Node, Tab: Render, Display as: Subdivision) the mesh as subdivided that is roughly as in blender Geometry with a base Subdivision modifier.

Houdini vs other DCC
Sidefx main customers don't use houdini for modelling for the most parts. where houdini shines is in parametric solutions where some part is modelling but less traditionally type that is sculpting or box modelling. in the last years it has got better to model in houdini but it is still not on pair with other Dcc tools. for the FX department there is today only houdini relevant or game level development houdini gets more and more used. in the lighting department solaris is one of the main solutions.
houdini is a special dcc tool that has it's success in the parametric way of working and not in the classic way.

Note:
i learn blender before the 2000's where it was below 2mb and i have learn Maya and later i learned houdini every tool shines in some area. when you understand them you know maya isn't that beautiful as the name suggest.

LukeP
I think SideFX recognized that and Viewport is being redone. Hopefully in H20.

There will be a new Viewport in H20 based on Vulkan, this task has been started 2-3 years ago(guess). Othere DCC are also on the shift to Vulkan.
Modo has showen a first glimps (very basic), blender should bring end of the year a alpha/beta version.

It's in the doc's.
456.cmd or 456.py will be executed when the user loads a hip file.

https://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/hom/locations.html#startup [www.sidefx.com]

Just for the question for a native M1 based render.

Karma CPU uses intel embree libs (oneAPI) and they added some ARM support. For getting more CPU/GPU support it is today far better then 2-3 years ago.

WalterK
I'm not sure I agree with the assessment that Windows is the predominate platform for larger companies. ILM is heavy OSX and is featured heavily in several forward facing video's put out by Disney. Now, how many of them are actual M1+ users is outside of my knowledge. I'm pretty sure Pixar is in the same boat.

I know a lot of people will drop a windows VM just to run the tool. I have found this to be the case on several tools who refuse to support OSX. Solidworks floored me when they offered their software in a VM in AWS.

At least I know there is an issue and won't be able to migrate some workflows over.

Em sorry but when you check the job requirement for the IT department and pipeline developers they are on Linux and some windows. They don't even mention OSX in the requirements! For IT manager In some jobs they mention osx but just as a nice to have.

duveil
Sure but I don`t like that moral Christian EULA nonsense.

is that still in the EULA? Was thinking that they removed it.

Houdini is a huge Software, there are many Options and Details it takes a lot of time to understand it as a houdini beginner.

GPU rendering is under LOP's Solaris context as w_maro noted.

Tutorials:
https://www.sidefx.com/learn/getting_started/ [www.sidefx.com]

NOTE:
Rendering in viewport is also possible with mantra but it is EOL

raincole
I mean... I had a quite long email thread between me and SideFX customer support. And I've installed clean new linux just for Houdini. And after all that effort and hassle, my conclusion is Houdini is generally quite unstable.

sounds strange i used long time ago houdini under linux and i didn't had issues made even stupid test if i can render a 100k x 100k image. there was a time when houdini was unstable but it was just after a new release and they fixed in 2 months that it was stable again.

i had on my Ryzen Computer some problems / crashes in houdini after i changed in the BIOS a Random Math option (something like that) years ago. it could also be a firmware issue or Configuration on BIOS level when you made even a fresh Linux installation and it didn't help.

sad to hear that you have such a stability problem, from the distance it is very hard to analyse why it happens.

My 100k Test:
https://www.sidefx.com/forum/topic/26669/ [www.sidefx.com]

raincole
I'm comparing Blender's animation tool vs KineFX and Blender's rendering tool vs Karma XPU/LOP. Blender is far more stable to me. Perhaps when it comes to physical simulation and extremely complex scenes, Blender is worse. But Houdini is the only software that crashes in "simple" cases (like rigging or UV-unwrapping very low-poly models) I've ever used.

I learned my brother houdini about 3 months ago what was intressting houdini crashed a lot on his machine.
We found out that microsoft teams (old client) when he has a voice or video call houdini will mostly crash.
Other smaller cause was the octane renderer but it could be reduced with updating the graphic driver. That fixed the most of the crashes.
The other part was the beginner lack of knowledge how you should work with houdini and how hoidini works. That just needed some time and houdini i now his primary DCC Software.

Sometimes it needs the knowlege why it crashes that takes time to analyse. Just saying the dcc software crashes a lot doesn't help nobody. Doesn't matter if it is houdini, blender,cinema 4d, maya, modo or 3ds max.

it depends on many many factors and in the price of just such a system it is irritating for just asking this question!

can you give more information about your studio / indie setup, what projects do you render? (simple CG animation or huge shots with simulations that are multiple Gigabytes per frame)

why only render? such a system can be used for massiv simulations.

Sorry i haven't seen that there exist a Python 3.7 Build.

Found a Article about it:
https://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/hom/commandline.html [www.sidefx.com]

This should work with a normal Python Runtime.

your lib path is wrong python3.7 doesn't exist in Houdini 19.5.
C:\Program Files\Side Effects Software\Houdini 19.5.569\houdini\python3.9libs

when you use hython you can import directly hou, in a python shell you need to import the lib.
hython is just houdini python shell with no UI it's the simplest way but not headless.

i dont have a hapi example but for hython i have a snippet.

Import:

Load a Hip File:
after that you can access the nodes like you would be inside Houdini in the Python Shell.

i haven't found a standalone lib or pip command of hapi.py outside the python libs folder but i think if you want to have a headless setup you need only the 3 files (hapi.exp, hapi.lib, hapi.pyd) in the houdini/python3.9libs folder in your custom python project.

You need to Learn more about Houdini, there are many Good Tutorials for a Beginner.
https://www.sidefx.com/learn/getting_started/ [www.sidefx.com]


For your Question it just need 2 Nodes a File SOP and a ROP Geometry Output inside a Geometry Node.
Made a Example (convert File.hiplc) it requires that your geo Files are a Sequence!
Only then Houdini File SOP can Automaticly read them as Sequence
Sequence Example:
mesh_0001.geo
mesh_0002.geo
mesh_0003.geo
...

tomtm
Maybe it‘s really well integrated and I don‘t understand the unique concept of USD.

The old Concept for rendering a scene was like this:
3D Scene Setup -> Render Engine Converte Scene in Native Format -> Render Engine Rendering -> Image File

Mantra has ifd files that it understand how rendering a scene.
Renderman version used rib
Redshift uses rs
Octane uses ocs or obrx
in other words every render Engine has it's own Scene Description File Format.

With USD it looks like this when the Render Engine is USD Based:
3D Scene Setup -> USD Files -> Render Engine Rendering -> Image File

Karma uses USD for Rendering the Scene Native
Renderman XPU also uses USD Native
Other Render Engines uses Converters or are in the process to make it Native.

When there is one Format every 3D Tool can understand the Scene (Import / Export) and every Render Engine can render the Scene.
There is also MaterialX that should be the native Shader Format that should bring more portability.
USD as it says is the Universal Scene Description File Format

tomtm
This is very confusing, what is the best way with the best performance?
At least it would be cool, if for Example A the Karma viewport would be accesible from the main Houdini viewport, it‘s very strange integration with a separate viewport panel.

It could be that there is a update or a change, what we know is that there will be a new Viewport based on Vulcan. it could be that the new Viewport will support all Contexts (sop, lop, cop, mat). (just a guess)
The main reason i would say was development Integration as with Solaris there was also Hydra for the viewport and when you want to mix it with other viewport OpenGL it is surly in the background not a simple task. When you know that you need to develop anyway a new Viewport you invest more time in to the new code.

tomtm
Will Karma be fully integrated like Arnold in Maya or Cycles in Blender.
At now, it's very user unfriendly.

Karma is a USD based Render Engine with Hydra Viewport Integration. In other words you could Integrate Karma in every Software that supports Hydra and USD and it feels like a native Renderer. Other Render Engines will feel the same as Karma in Solaris if they Support the USD / Hydra / MaterialX Specs.
Surly some Functionality is missing in Solaris, Karma needs some more Features but i am 100% sure H20 will be a awesome Release.

When you do manipulations on points, primitives then you use VEX or VOP.
When you want to import data,special UI, tooling then you use python.

If you want to master houdini you will learn anyway both. For the start you need to understand the basic's and use some expressions that is the hardest part as a new user.


My brother started 2 months ago to use houdini as a indie artist. 1 month was a hard time for him, 2 month he understands the houdini way and likes it more and more.
He used before cinema4d and maya and knows programming in these months the most complex VEX was a 2 liner.
He has done 2 customer projects and new projects will be done in houdini.
I helped him alot at the start and now just when there is a problem that he can't solve.

Good luck!

rickapex
is there a typical time of the year when new houdini versions get released?

Yes and No
March or October where some releases but no date is safe. SESI is too funky in that case but when they are very quiet it is near.

Btw. 18.02.2024 would be a nice date that would be 10'000 days after H1.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houdini_(software)#Release_history

jsmack
probably pretty simple, just add multiple refract bsdfs together. You won't get any neat tricks with polarization though.

okey thanks, will test that out.

I was asked if Mantra or karma has the possibility of Rendering Double Refraction Material.
Because my shader knowledge is just in the base level it would be nice if somebody has some advice's, tips.

i add some links that i have found about Birefringency.




Wiki
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birefringence [en.wikipedia.org]

Technical Papers
https://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2008/weidlich_2007_rrbuc/weidlich_2007_rrbuc-paper.pdf [www.cg.tuwien.ac.at]
http://www.ijfcc.org/papers/150-K00012.pdf [www.ijfcc.org]

Research Render
https://cgg.mff.cuni.cz/ART/about/ [cgg.mff.cuni.cz]