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TOTAL DURATION: 45m 08s

In this lesson, you will smash a wine glass then slow down time to hold onto the big splash. This effect involves both an RBD simulation for the shattered glass and a fluid simulation for the wine. You will learn how to set up the dynamic network and output the simulations. Visual effect shots often involve a combination of different kinds of dynamic solvers and Houdini’s dynamic network is designed to achieve a unified result with these different solvers.

You will also use a retime node to slow down the simulation when it is at its most explosive then reverse time to return to the starting point. You will then move the simulations into Solaris/LOPS, set up lights and a camera, then render the shot using the Karma renderer.

The complete Houdini Foundations for Houdini 19.5 is also available as Downloadable PDF and a Print-on-Demand book through the Lulu Ebook company. This 224 page book contains 9 chapters designed to help artists take their first steps into Houdini.

Research for this lesson by Michael Buckley

CREATED BY

rmagee
ROBERT MAGEE

Robert Magee is a Senior Product Marketing Manager at SideFX who has been working with Houdini for 20 years. He has created lots of learning material and demos designed to help artists understand how going procedural with Houdini can benefit their work.

More from Robert Magee

COMMENTS

  • Manuko 3 years, 2 months ago  | 

    Straight to the point and helpfull, thank you!

  • SerjKirchano 3 years, 2 months ago  | 

    awesome course, thanks!

  • johnchen 3 years, 2 months ago  | 

    Hi Robert, thank you for recording,
    could you reupload the project files? they are empty.

  • rmagee 3 years, 2 months ago  | 

    The only file is in the TEX folder - otherwise you will build the project from scratch

  • WalkBoat 3 years, 2 months ago  | 

    Hi!Thanks for the tutorial. I have a question.
    Is the scene unit in meters? So the glass is about six meters high? Does it need to be made in real actual size, and does size and proportion matter?

  • rmagee 3 years, 2 months ago  | 

    Yes it would be more accurate if built to scale. Since this effect is designed to be a bit exaggerated, we could tweak parameters to get the look we wanted without worrying about scale.

  • sICFX 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    Hey loved it, made it, check out my version

    • sICFX 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

      No links eh sidefx? check this out, dribbble-DOT-com-SLASH-shots-SLASH-15118866

  • JordiFernandez 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    Hi Robert,

    I enjoyed very much the tutorial, thanks so much, ideal for a newbie as me.

    What I don't get is the bullet in the render, I redid the tutorial from scratch but I don't find the issue. I thought could be a problem with the position information being in the geo node so I tried with a transform node but the same result. It's frustrating as the result of the render is fantastic but the bullet missing is hurting me as I can't see what I'm doing wrong.

    Thanks and kind regards,
    Jordi

  • rmagee 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    The bullet must have been there for the sim - did you set up the retime node properly on it? It should only be visible for a few frames then it is out of frame then based on the lesson we remove the return of the bullet in the retime node so it is a one way trip for the bullet - if you want the bullet to come back then don't delete the end keyframes.

  • JordiFernandez 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    Thanks Robert,

    Yes, the retime is correct. In the solaris stage I can see the bullet on the floor for the 5 first frames and then it disappears, it should be visible on frame 6 at Y5 just an instant but it's not there. And it's there in the Houdini sim.

    In case you are so kind and I'm not enjoying you I can enclose the hip for your check?

    Thanks so much!
    Jordi

    • AndreSerena 2 years, 8 months ago  | 

      Hi Robert and Jordi

      Did you manage to solve your problem Jordi?
      Or find out why? I’m have kind of the same problem, the thing is that separately each geo appears and behaves correctly then when i merge the 3 of them, the bullet disappears all of this in the beginning when you import your references to Solaris … i checked and re-checked and if it’s view toggled alone without the other 2 references the the and the glass and the wine, it appears there and the animation is perfect I just can’t understand there’s no logic at all…

      Thanks!!

  • JordiFernandez 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    In fact in the example of sCIFX you can see the bullet also is not correct

  • VnhHiu 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    Sir, can you reupload the project files as they're all empty? btw thank you so much for the knowledge.

    • VnhHiu 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

      sorry for the inconvenience. I've just found a file...

  • jfcdr41695 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    where are the project files..can someone guide me??

  • rmagee 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    There is a project files button near the top - there is only one file in the tex directory which you use for tracing - the other directories just comprise a typical project directory structure - you will learn how to "set" this directory as the project directory in the lesson.

  • jfcdr41695 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    Im sorry Robert... I am not able to find the button..Please help me

  • jfcdr41695 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    Ive got them Robert.. Thank you!

  • rmagee 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    Glad you found them.

  • Ferdose01 3 years, 1 month ago  | 

    Thank's Robert. awesome tutorial.
    I'd like to ask something. Is there a way to modify the collision that comes from the RBD into the Flip solver? I can't find the way to call the RBDs inside a sopsolver to add a peak so the liquid doesn't drip throw the cracks.

    Thanks Again

  • thatjmax 3 years ago  | 

    Has anyone else had issues where the bullet seems to collide with something before it actually reaches the glass?
    https://www.loom.com/share/76996201766244b1810a349882a10817

    • thatjmax 3 years ago  | 

      I think I got it resolved. A reddit member had me lower the substeps on the RBD solver within AutoDopNetwork and it looks like it's working now.

  • matt-k3 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

    Failed at the first hurdle which doesn't inspire confidence for the tutorial: changing the viewport. Is this tutorial for an older version? It looks like it was posted Feb 2021.

    Follwoing the tutorial, I should press V to get to quad view and then, with mouse over the front view, press spacebar and B to get to front view.

    On my version (Houdini FX version 18.5.563), I enter QUAD view by pressing B (toggles QUAD/SINGLE view then hover mouse over FRONT VIEW and press B to change.

    I will continue with the tutorial of course, but this can be frustrating for a new user.

    • matt-k3 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

      Ah - OK - SPACEBAR toggles something else (like view and obj). So it's SPACEBAR then B not SPACEBAR and B.

      • rmagee 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

        Glad that you have it working - it is true - if you are already in the view tool then b will toggle quad to single but if you are using another tool then spacebar invokes the view tool and then b can be used to toggle. Usually I just teach spacebar - b even if the view tool is active to get into the habit of using the spacebar when using other tools.

  • Arnaud_Houdini 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

    Hello Robert,

    Great tutorial, but there is something i can not fix : When I launch the simulation after the video number 4, everything work except the bullet don't go through the glass and bounce on it. What did I miss ? is it the density of the glass which is too much (2000 as you say in the video) ? Thanks very much for your help

    • rmagee 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

      What is the density of the bullet in your simulation? It should be 11340 which should push it past the glass.

      • Arnaud_Houdini 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

        Thanks for your answer Robert. Yes i put exactly this density on the bullet, and 2000 on the glass. Is the problem the size of the glass (I follow the tutorial and if on the grid 1 square is 1 meter, the glass is 3 meters high or something like this, or something else ? Please help :)))

  • Arnaud_Houdini 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

    Thanks for your answer Robert. Yes i put exactly this density on the bullet, and 2000 on the glass. Is the problem the size of the glass (I follow the tutorial and if on the grid 1 square is 1 meter, the glass is 3 meters high or something like this, or something else ? Please help :)

    • rmagee 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

      The size is the same as the tutorial was set up as - that shouldn't be the issue. It is hard to determine without seeing your setup - you are saying that the glass is not breaking at all?

      • Arnaud_Houdini 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

        No, the glass is breaking, but the bullet dont go through, she kind of bounce on it and go on the top

  • kaufmans-curse 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

    Hi Robert,

    Great tutorial. Brand new to this, so it feels like this tutorial is a great way to learn lots very quickly.

    I've gone through it twice now and much faster second time. But I'm having a problem with the final render out of the Karma node.... Output filename is right. Range is right, Camera is right etc, just nothing produced.... really quick to render (zips through the 50 frames in around a minute) and no file in the render folder to bring into Mplay. Zilch.

    I'm on a Mac Mini M1 with 18.5.563 installed.

    What am I doing wrong (apart from owning a mac - haha) Very frustrating. Is Karma buggy on Mac? Help!

    • rmagee 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

      Not sure why the Mac wouldn't be working. Is it a new M1 chip Mac mini? Are you using the denoiser? What graphics card do you have? Did Karma render fine to the Scene view?

      • kaufmans-curse 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

        Many thanks for your reply Robert,

        Yes it is new M1 chip mac mini. I've tried with and without denoiser. The gfx card is just the integrated gpu of the M1 - nothing additional. And, yes Karma renders perfectly in scene view - with and without denoiser. I can create/export gallery stills etc. Anecdotally I've read M1 chip seems to render the denoiser fine and that karma renders out fine too. So, at a lose at the moment...???

      • kaufmans-curse 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

        It's taking about 3 mins a frame to render in the Scene View... so the actual render to disk should be an hour or two, I guess? It's taking *1 min*, so it's not even attempting to write anything...

      • kaufmans-curse 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

        And i've just tried the same file on my Macbook pro (not M1) and it does the same - zips through the render dialogue box in a minute and produces nothing... so frustrating!

        • rmagee 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

          Is it just this scene or any Karma rendering? If you can get the same issue with a sphere/light/camera then submit a bug and include the scene that isn't working and specs for your computer - it will have to be looked at by the dev team.

          • kaufmans-curse 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

            OK, yes, great idea... will try some simple tests and see how i get on with some other renders. Thanks for your help!

      • kaufmans-curse 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

        I got it all working - it was a bug in the production build - the latest nightly build works fine. Nice to see the render at last!

  • ManuN3 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

    Hi Robert. Loving this collection so far.
    I'm running into the exact same issue as @Arnaud_Houdini where the bullet hits the glass, the glass breaks but the bullet, instead of going through it, just bounces back (imagine a rubber ball hitting a concrete wall). Any idea of what could be causing it? I tried rising the density for the bullet to 100k and it gets kinda better but still doesn't go fully through (besides the fact that it's probably a very unrealistic value).
    Thanks you!

  • rmagee 2 years, 10 months ago  | 

    Not sure what is the issue - if you can send your Scene file to me (not the caches) - then I will try it out and see if there is an easy fix - rmagee@sidefx.comz

    in the meantime just hide the bullet and render without it - it is on screen for so little time that it isn't needed to watch the glass smash

  • steviedisco 2 years, 9 months ago  | 

    Hey, great tutorial - thank you. Mine came out fantasticly, so pleased. These have been a great intro to Houdini, which for me makes the most sense out of all the 3d apps i've tried. So stable too, had not one random crash or anything which makes a change :)

    • rmagee 2 years, 9 months ago  | 

      Glad to hear it was helpful and that Houdini is clicking for you.

  • shondiaz 2 years, 8 months ago  | 

    Thank you for the excellent tutorial! This is exactly what I was looking to learn here.
    I am having a problem that I hope you will have insight into.

    I am on Part 4, step 7; Video 4 @ 3:30

    When you say "we are not looking at the convex pieces, but the hi-res model... all the information from the convex pieces is being passed to this one (the hi-res model)";
    At this point, my "hi-res-model" is not showing, but the cracked version. I have went over the steps and looked at the display options to be sure there was not anything in particular that was altering the view. I must be missing something?

    The little comment section does not allow images, and you don't have to click on this to see what I mean, but I put it here anyways for completion.
    https://ibb.co/TmxbQxw
    and here is the .hipc save file (again may not even need it)
    https://drive.google.com/file/d/12fuERX3zkD3no_lFxPOFvp0tOKk08VgG/view?usp=sharing

    • rmagee 2 years, 8 months ago  | 

      That is correct. You have Smooth Wired Shaded whereas the video is Smooth Shaded which means the cracks aren't as visible until you run the simulation. The Hi-res-model is meant to have cracks in it - that is what you are driving with the convex pieces.

      Later you will bring back the wineglass without any cracks.

  • shondiaz 2 years, 8 months ago  | 

    Oh yes you are right, the very next lesson did indeed cover that with the switch node. Very clever combining that with the sharp curve to act as a just-in-time swap of the models. Bravo on this tutorial :)
    You are a scholar and a saint!

  • shondiaz 2 years, 8 months ago  | 

    After completing this tutorial, I found that upgrading to an indie license broke the karma rendering?
    I created this 30 second youtube clip that shows a side by side of the original uncommercial version and the problematic indie version.
    I compared as many settings as I knew how and was not able to trace down the root cause of this issue. Hoping you have some insight here?
    https://youtu.be/JXSJLtobysc

    • shondiaz 2 years, 8 months ago  | 

      Follow up to this. I re-exported everything I could find (Which I had already done once before posting here). After clicking "Save To Disk" on every node that had the option, it got rid of that karma black box rendering.

  • AndreSerena 2 years, 8 months ago  | 

    Hi Robert

    I’m have kind of the same problem as Jordi, the thing is that separately each geo appears and behaves correctly then when i merge the 3 of them, the bullet disappears all of this in the beginning when you import your references to Solaris … i checked and re-checked and if it’s view toggled alone without the other 2 references the the and the glass and the wine, it appears there and the animation is perfect I just can’t understand there’s no logic at all…

    Thanks!!

  • nicolashkpip 2 years, 7 months ago  | 

    Just starting to learning houdini, just watched the first intro episode and I was wondering if there is a way to automatically generate the scatters during the collision time, instead of manually control it. Or was it hard to achieve the same result using automatic ways？

    • rmagee 2 years, 7 months ago  | 

      There is a Make Breakable option that you can try without pre-shattering the object. The simulation will be slower but the results are interesting. The pre-shattering gives you more control over what the pieces are going to look like before the simulation takes place.

      • nicolashkpip 2 years, 7 months ago  | 

        Thank you. I wish I could be such a bad ass at houdini as you do.

  • sking_xyz 2 years, 4 months ago  | 

    Hi Robert I'm trying to make something similar, but with a container, but i have the problem that the fluid disappears even if I increase the particle resolution and the particle scale... I don't know what to do....

  • istratesculuigi 2 years, 2 months ago  | 

    It would be useful to have the project files, not just the Tex image. Apparently when I subdivide the glass, it does a Simple Subdivision for me, increasing nr of faces but keeping the polygon shape, without smoothing out the surface of the glass. That gives me issues when it comes to PolyExtruding for the liquid.

  • CGGR_Jay 2 years, 2 months ago  | 

    I follow the same process but the subdivide doesn't work. Can you explain more please??

    • rmagee 2 years, 2 months ago  | 

      Be sure to follow the PDF document which has been updated for H19 - the new curve node creates bezier curves by default an you need to change its Primitive Type to Polygon before drawing the curve.

  • yyyk 2 years, 2 months ago  | 

    Please tell me the details when selecting Revolve.(Part1_04)
    It cannot be subdivided.

  • rmagee 2 years, 2 months ago  | 

    Make sure it is a polygon curve not a besieged curve - the new curve tool defaults to beaker - also make sure there is only one point at each marker

    • yyyk 2 years, 1 month ago  | 

      Thank you!

  • OFFICE_GUY 2 years, 1 month ago  | 

    Hello, I have a problem with solaris part. Maybe i did something wrong in USD export making part, but in my solaris stage in reference of a wine glass I get normal mesh and fractured at the same time. Maybe I did somethig wrong with the switch, even that it's working absolutely fine in the build. But still, it is strange. It would be helpful if someone has an answer to this kind of problem.

    • OFFICE_GUY 2 years, 1 month ago  | 

      I don't know how but I've fixed it!

  • rmagee 2 years, 1 month ago  | 

    The attribute delete on page 12 step 9 removes the name attribute which prevents that from happening.

  • GlamboDesigner 2 years, 1 month ago  | 

    Hello Robert! Can you help me?

    At first I had a problem, the same as many, with the fact that the new curves tool makes bezier curves, not polygons, figured it out by reading the forum here.

    Now the problem is that the subdivide node sees every point on the curve after the revolver node as a hard edge. It’s as if the crease node does not work on the edges that I chose, but on all edges, although everything is displayed correctly in the highlighted groups, only those that I chose

  • Nicolas Lekai 2 years ago  | 

    when i press 'rbd convex proxy' nothing happens:( - i've done the tut 2ice over...same thing...any ideas?

  • NadaSP 1 year, 7 months ago  | 

    Hello

    I’ve been trying to render it in karma, but it’s not working!!.. I’ve followed the steps correctly & when I press “Render to Disk” it never ends, any help plz! :/ & is it possible to render it with redshift?

    I’m using ‘MacBook Pro 2019’…

    Many thanks

  • cxtrxs 1 year, 6 months ago  | 

    Hello,
    I am not sure whats going wrong, I keep getting this error "VDB primitive 'surface' has a narrow band width that is less than 3 voxel units" when ever I finishing retiming the wine fluid and connecting it to the particlefluidsurface1 node. Everything else retimes correctly, but I cant get the winefluid to export as a usd properly.

    Thanks for the help

  • 1014315088 1 year, 6 months ago  | 

    hi, I got some trouble with the subdivide part. It just didn't work, can you give me some advice?

  • sgtkaylock 1 year, 5 months ago  | 

    So, I am new to Houdini, but really trying to get my bearings. Decided to follow this tutorial and have had 2 days of trying to track down this error.
    Error
    Invalid source /obj/wine_fluid/particlefluidsurface1/erode_non_compressed
    Error: RuntimeError: The transform must have uniform scale for the LevelSetTracker to function.

    I cannot seem to get the fluid surface past frame 10 after the retime. Any Help would be greatly appreciated, if more info is needed, I will be happy to supply it. Just hoping this is an easy mistake I have made but I have gone through the video and the PDF twice from scratch and run into the same issue.
    Thank you

  • MapXu 1 year, 5 months ago  | 

    The retime node may be unpacking geos therefore the particlefluidsurface node in your wine_fluid obj can't interpolate properly. Add a pack node between the retime node and the particlefluidsurface node. This should fix the problem.

    • mattt_6 1 year, 5 months ago  | 

      Thank you so much!

    • zhutianci123456 1 year, 4 months ago  | 

      thank you. it solves my problem.

    • Sandip66 1 year, 3 months ago  | 

      You saved the day.

    • tniran 1 year, 3 months ago  | 

      Thank you. I was stuck here too. this really need to be added to an updated .pdf document

    • j-s 1 week, 6 days ago  | 

      Many thanks @matt_6, this solved my problem as well. This should really be mentioned in the otherwise very good tutorial.

  • dhuiting 1 year, 3 months ago  | 

    For Anyone having the issues where the subdivide doesn't work. In the curve node change primitive type to Polygon. Then redraw the curve.

  • dhuiting 1 year, 3 months ago  | 

    I followed the video and PDF directions exactly but during step 7 of the Boolean Shatter my wine glass and fracture sheets seem to merge into one crazy piece of geometry that looks like a total mess when I explode it. The wine glass pieces get much thicker as increase the uniform scale of the exploded view. I went back and double checked everything many times. The Boolean node shows a warning that says:

    Warning
    Crossed boundary (unshared) edges in solid A: p4459-189 p2000-4567-4459 p3251-1035-2000 p2003-4566-3251 p4565-216-2003 p2104-4673-4565 p3355-1088-2104 p2107-4672-3355 p4671-243-2107 p2208-4779-4671 p3459-1141-2208 p2211-4778-3459 p4777-270-2211 p2312-4885-4777 p3563-1194-2312 p2315-4884-3563 p4883-297-2315 p4989-4883

    I'm dead in my tracks until I can solve this. Any thoughts?

    thanks!

  • dhuiting 1 year, 3 months ago  | 

    Now, the re-timed fluid sim will only export 6 frames to USD. Any way to fix this?

  • rmagee 1 year, 2 months ago  | 

    The tutorial has been updated for Houdini 19.5

  • KRSHN 1 year, 1 month ago  | 

    after using resolve tool, the subdivision is not working properly.
    please help me.
    I had tried too many times.
    here is the screenshot.

    https://drive.google.com/file/d/1NhweS4Q5QRO8Ud43q57Vod8QhxS1Jp2I/view?usp=sharing

  • miguelroqueni 1 year ago  | 

    Hi robert!! thx for this awesome tutorial, it all worked perfect for me, i cant render it though cause it crashes haha, but awesome tutorial, i also wanted to ask for your pc specs if you dont mind. Thanks again have a nice day!

    Miguel.

  • RyuHayabusa 1 year ago  | 

    Excellent lesson - 5 stars (tried to add them, but it seems there is a bug, and the rating disappears each time I re-login. Not sure). I've just started with Houdini, and found this. So much things covered, easy to follow, and inspiring. Love the reverse time. Thank you!

  • Ra138 11 months, 1 week ago  | 

    Starting this tutorial today. :)

    • Ra138 11 months ago  | 

      Part 3 completed. I need more perfection in curve tool and copy node.
      Had headache yesterday so missed working. Just read the pdf and saw videos.

  • purushwani 10 months, 3 weeks ago  | 

    HI,
    in part 6 after doing save to disk everything is gone,
    can anyone help me to solve this problem?

  • jaws.m.s 10 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

    boolean gives a warning about crossed boundaries (unshared). the pieces look weird and messed up after the explode view node, any ideas ?

  • aabirahammed 10 months, 1 week ago  | 

    I did exactly what you showed here with the materials. but my wine material isn't showing color. it's just transparent. why is that? Can you help ?

    here's the link to the screenshot and please help me. I don't know why this is happening.
    https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1FgBSSntHzh_wBb-VC5Uk-rh-Rh1JfM-G?usp=sharing

    • rmagee 10 months, 1 week ago  | 

      Are you rendering with Karma XPU? If so then try the default Karma.

      • urae89 3 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

        I have a same problem with Karma XPU.
        Karma CPU rendering works for me.

      • Crazy_Chintu 2 months, 4 weeks ago  | 

        When we choose Karma XPU the wine looks like water but with Karma CPU it looks like wine.
        Is there a problem with XPU version?

      • Crazy_Chintu 2 months, 4 weeks ago  | 

        Even after rendering with karma CPU the wine is rendering like water.
        Any solution..?

  • dhuiting 10 months, 1 week ago  | 

    I've noticed the wine fluid is flickering. It's that way in your render as well. How to get this smooth? More substeps for the retime?

  • dhuiting 10 months, 1 week ago  | 

    Fixed it. In Particle Fluid Surface node, changed surfacing method to spherical, and set adaptivity to 0.

  • senowhyte 10 months ago  | 

    Nice tutorial. I tried to open the usd files (glass, wine and bullet) through the reference node in solaris but i cant find the saved usd files. have searched but the usd folder is empty. please how can fix this?

    • rmagee 10 months ago  | 

      Check your USD export nodes to see the location of the files you exported. Maybe you sent the files to a different directory.

  • techmaster1 9 months, 3 weeks ago  | 

    I'm at the last step. i have added shaders to all the objects. something weird happens. When the bullet hits the glass the broken pieces just vanish instead of just flying around. because of this the entire wineglass has disappeared from frame 7. How can i fix this?

  • natrianvfx 8 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

    Amazing tutorial, I enjoy this smashing/destruction simulations. Thank you very much!

  • cplaprade 7 months, 3 weeks ago  | 

    Hello, so far it's been a great tutorial! I am on Part 7 and my .usd files are saving as .usdnc files so I can't see them. I am sure I am doing something wrong, do you know what I am doing?

    Thanks in advance!

    • rmagee 7 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

      That is because you are using either Apprentice or an Education edition of Houdini. You should be able to load them as .usdnc into your version of Houdini. If not then let me know.

      • Varunastra 4 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

        I couldn't load it as .usdnc and couldn't find a solution on any online forum, either.

        • Varunastra 4 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

          I figured it out. Apparently, file path names can't have spaces in them, any spaces have to be renamed to underscores. My folder was named "Houdini Projects", the software can't read any folder name that has a space in it. So I had to rename all the folder paths leading up to the file which I wanted to reference to have no spaces, only underscores.

  • LukeP 7 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

    So personally, I find this part a bit scary and confusing. Once you select the rigid body convex proxy from the shelf it goes from a newbie to 'holy crap'. I do find that someone like Moeen Sayed tends to explain things much better. Why would someone use this workflow vs. perhaps something more basic with the RBDs in SOPS?

  • SergeantNH 5 months ago  | 

    Hey Guys, when I select the bullet on the obj level and then press RBD Objects in "Rigid Bodies", it doesnt put the bullet in the AutoDopNetwork. Any idea what i did wrong? Thank you

    • SergeantNH 5 months ago  | 

      Found the mistake. "Selectable" button wasnt activated. Awesome tutorial so far

      • Riv 4 months ago  | 

        I'm having the same problem as you, what is the "selectable" button?

        • j-s 1 week, 6 days ago  | 

          I had the same problem and found the solution also mentioned by @SergeantNH above: the "selectable"-button is the green button on the very right of the geometry nodes in the object level of the network.

  • Varunastra 4 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

    I did not like the teaching style, you have to figure some steps out on your own. Many small details are skipped out and the instructor just does them expecting you to know it, so I would say this tutorial is not for absolute beginners, but for somebody that has used the software for a week or two. That being said, I was still able to follow along, but it was annoying as hell.

    • Varunastra 4 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

      Actually, thank you for making such a beginner-unfriendly tutorial. It forced me to do a lot of self learning and debugging!

      • Varunastra 4 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

        Okay, I'm stuck again. Trying to reference the .usndc file in Solaris gives me an error:

        "Error
        Unable to find layer file: D:/Houdini
        Warning
        Cannot determine file format for @d:/Houdini@"

        • Varunastra 4 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

          * .usdnc

          • Varunastra 4 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

            I figured it out. Apparently, file path names can't have spaces in them, any spaces have to be renamed to underscores. My folder was named "Houdini Projects", the software can't read any folder name that has a space in it. So I had to rename all the folder paths leading up to the file which I wanted to reference to have no spaces, only underscores.

  • byron_chutz 4 months, 2 weeks ago  | 

    Hi there, just out of curiousity, why do i have to set the background image scale to 0.26/0.26 instead of 5/5 to achieve similar size in the video?

    • Hakobus 3 months, 3 weeks ago  | 

      I was wondering the same. I did it 5/5 and my glass is like 50 meters tall, so I ended up scaling it down. However, I think that broke the RBD, because my glass won't fall apart.

    • j-s 1 week, 6 days ago  | 

      Yes, that makes not much sense to me as well. I also ended up using a "match size" node in "wine_glas" after the "subdivide1" node, with target size set to 7,7,7 and Justify Y
      set to "min".

  • Riv 4 months ago  | 

    Tutorial was going fantastic until using the RBD convex tool in video 4. It's not packing the information into that DOP network for the wine glass so any help here would be appreciated! I also had the scaling issue with the background image which had me scratching my head as to why my glass was so massive haha.

  • Hakobus 3 months, 3 weeks ago  | 

    So, after the saving the cache to disk and adding the retime node, the playback is crazy slow, and it's definitely still trying to bake/cache something (there's the blue caching bar on the timeline and it says it's doing substeps of DOP cook). It's so slow that I feel like it's still doing the entire fluid sim in the background, even though it's supposedly cached and playing from disk. What am I missing?

    • Hakobus 3 months, 3 weeks ago  | 

      ...and after Houdini crashed and I had to do the cache to disk again, it is now working as it should.

  • Fernando_Criativo3d 3 months, 1 week ago  | 

    Dont know why but when I merge the Fracture with the wine glass it is above the Glass....anyone experienced the same? Houdini 20.0.568

    • motoservo 1 month ago  | 

      Same here. The issue seems to be with the image merge, brings in the glass about 50% higher than the original glass. I changed "Into Specified Object" to "Into This Object" and that fixed it.

  • Maxpixel 2 months, 1 week ago  | 

    rbd convex proxy does not work for me, that is, the wine glass does not break into parts, it remains intact during the simulation

  • kraskii 1 month, 4 weeks ago  | 

    Hello! Thank you for the tutorial. I am running into an issue where I do not know how to get to the smooth wire shading on video 4, 0.22 seconds into the video. I hit the "C" key but do not get the same options. I tried going through different routes to find the shading but unfortunately it does not come up. I am on Houdini version 19.5.303, non-commercial.

    Thank you!

    • motoservo 1 month ago  | 

      Try V, instead.

  • Oskar333 1 month, 2 weeks ago  | 

    something is wrong, i did it twice and theres still issues. One is scale of everything, then pivot point of scratches just change position by his own and at the end the scratches almost dissapeard. After i connect it to the boolean the glass didnt break............................................... what the hell is wrong with these softwares ?

  • motoservo 1 month ago  | 

    On a Mac (the last of the Intel with the GPU bump), Edu edition.
    When I select the wine node and click FLIP Fluid From Object, nothing happens.

    Please advise.

    Also, the first time I went through the tutorial things weren't working out as instructed. After I got about five videos in I started over and realized the values you gave for the glass were off. Here are updated parameter values that make the glass the right size, and the videos match up, afterward. Just figured I'd share in case somebody else runs into this.

    Image Offset: 0, 3.2
    Images Scale: .28, .28

    Also, the image merge ended up about 50% higher than the original glass. I changed "Into Specified Object" to "Into This Object" and that fixed it.

    Please let me know if you have any ideas of why the FLIP isn't converting the geo to particles.

  • motoservo 1 month ago  | 

    UPDATE
    For anyone following along that has the same issue I just reported in my last comment. After many hours spent trying to figure out why my wine object wasn't converting to a FLIP I tumbled under the object and saw that there was still a hole in the geometry, at the bottom. I polyfilled like he instructed us to fill in the top and then the object converted to FLIP okay. Also, I did confirm that that instructions in the tutorial no longer work, the object needs to be displayed in order to convert using the FLIP to Object. In the tut he makes a point to say that the node can be in the state of no display, but that doesn't work as of Houdini 20.0.625 MacOS.

  • motoservo 1 month ago  | 

    I'm running into more issues, this one I'm at a loss to fix. I've it as far as setting up the three objects in the USD scene, and the merge shows the bottom of the wine starting at about the top of the glass. So, in a real world scale, it's a few inches too high. Everything looked fine up to this step.

    With the caching (and really long times to rebake every time I change something) and extra levels of complexity I'm not sure of how to troubleshoot further. I've spent all week to get this far.

    Please advise.

  • motoservo 1 month ago  | 

    Pardon the typo

    I'm running into more issues, this one I'm at a loss to fix. I've gone as far as setting up the three objects in the USD scene, and the merge shows the bottom of the wine starting at about the top of the glass. So, in a real world scale, it's a few inches too high. Everything looked fine up to this step (before the USD).

    With the caching (and really long times to rebake every time I change something) and extra levels of complexity I'm not sure of how to troubleshoot further. I've spent all week to get this far.

    Please advise.

  • motoservo 1 month ago  | 

    As a crutch, I've added a Transform node on the wine, set to negative 4. That's the same amount the glass was moved up, in the first lesson. I'm sure there's a correlation there, just not sure how to pin it down.

  • motoservo 1 month ago  | 

    That is, I added the transform on the USD stage, just before the merge and just after the wine reference.

  • motoservo 1 month ago  | 

    I can't edit my comment here so I'd like to add that the bullet was also off. So, in the USD scene, instead of adding -4 to the x-axis on the wine I added 4 to the x-axis on the glass. But later, adjusted to 3.7 when I saw that it looked a bit much and the glass was hovering a bit over the grid. Just eyeballed it but it matches up now.

  • antost4work 1 month ago  | 

    Thanks for the tutorial! One question, Your final result is little bit jittery/flickery and I have that problem as well. Any advices how to make it cleaner?

  • Sunamo_man 1 week, 4 days ago  | 

    Hi Robert, thanks for the great tutorial, it was a lot of fun. I'm just having one issue, though. When assigning the materials, the redness of the wine material doesn't show up when using Karma XPU, only in Karma CPU does it appear correctly. It is just clear in XPU rendering mode. Any clues as to what could be causing this? I noticed another user had the same issue. Thanks for your help!

    • rmagee 1 week, 2 days ago  | 

      That is because the material is made using VEX which is only supported by Karma CPU - to see the color in Karma XPU you need to use Material X. That is why the 19.5 lessons limit the use of XPU - for future updates to the lessons Material X and XPU will be used for all the lessons.

      • Sunamo_man 1 week, 2 days ago  | 

        Thanks for the response, Robert! That makes sense. Now I'll go test this out.

      • Kareeem 22 hours, 12 minutes ago  | 

        Thanks, I was looking for the same thing!

        Also thank you for sharing the knowledge!

  • martinvonwill 2 days, 6 hours ago  | 

    I'm on a MAC, when using the selection tool in Edge mode, for selecting parts of the wine glass i cant get the yellow lines to select more than one edge at a time. They only turn cyan, not yellow.

  • martinvonwill 2 days, 5 hours ago  | 

    Ok, i resolved the edge selection, but when adding the Crease node, i do not get the Group numbers that this tutorial shows, nor am I seeing the Edge selections anymore. Basically the Crease does not work.

  • martinvonwill 2 days, 4 hours ago  | 

    I dont how you are getting the Group numbers in paramets, automatically whenever you create a new Node. When modelling the bullet and applied the Polyextrude, your tutorial shows all these numbers right away in the Parameter settings under Group. i have the edges selected, but when the Polyextrude is applied and selected all the Edges disappear, let alone seeing the green highlight. Then the transformations are completely off even when entering the exact number values in the tutorial.

    This is highly frustrating as no matter how closely you watch the tutorial there is always something off.

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