Create an ‘Auto-Fence’ asset in Houdini – The Nodes

Create an ‘Auto-Fence’ asset in Houdini – The Nodes

on Sep 24th 2010 with 21 comments
Tutorial Details
  • Software: Houdini
  • Difficulty: Intermediate
  • Estimated Completion Time: 3+ Hours

Final Product What You'll Be Creating

This entry is part 1 of 2 in the series ‘Auto-Fence’ in Houdini

In our very first Houdini tutorial, Alvaro Castaneda walks us through how to create an amazing Auto-Fence asset, and in doing so shows just why Houdini can be such a powerful part of the VFX workflow.

Download the Project Files for this tutorial

Video 1

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Note: click the ‘Monitor’ icon to view tutorial in full-screen HD.

Video 2

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Note: click the ‘Monitor’ icon to view tutorial in full-screen HD.

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By

Rollover to read this author's bio or click through to see a full list of posts by this author.

Hi! I'm Alvaro Castañeda, best known as "varomix". I lost a little of my self back in 1993 at a Jurassic Park screening, and that totally changed my life. Toy Story finished the job in 1995 - there was no turning back! I started my way in 3D back in 1998, first using 3ds Max, then Cinema4D and finally in 1999, I met Maya 2.0. Since then I've done CGI for print, web, TV, Film, DVD, I guess anything that has pixels in it!  

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  • lloyd

    i’d like to see things like this for max and softimage

  • http://3dessentials.com 3dEssentials.com

    I am not sure about Softimage with the ICE, but for 3ds max it wouldn’t be that easy to set up a tool like that. It would involve a lot of scripting… Or maybe it would be a lot easier than I think if using particle flow… Something I’ll have to look into i guess :)

  • abojung

    by the way, cgtuts should be carefull to who they pay. he is using non-commercial version of houdini. sidefx is not gonna be too happy about it. cheers

    • http://www.sidefx.com Robert Magee

      We do not want the non-commercial version to be used for production work that would compete with what our customers do on a day-to-day basis. The use of Apprentice to make tutorials is fine even if there is money involved.

      Robert Magee, Product Marketing Manager, Side Effects Software Inc.

      • http://www.badgrenola.com Matt Brealey

        Thanks for the quick response Robert. I really wish Side Effects Software’s overall approach to training was seen as the benchmark by more companies!

        Matt

      • abojung

        well thats good to know. i always thought wherever money is involved, we cant really use non-commercial version, other than personal projects and demoreels. Never thought someone from SES will drop by to confirm this confusion. cheers. Also for Robert Magee, if your site could upload more tuts on your new fluids and dynamics as well as the new fracture feature, it would really help us jump start with the node based workflow to dynamics. but for now, im just so stuck with Maya’s attributes style workflow. :( cheers

      • http://www.sidefx.com Robert Magee

        Well any work for a client is out of course but writing tutorials or teaching is OK for making money with Apprentice. Skills provide a service to the community and we encourage any and all efforts to share what you know.

        Robert Magee, Product Marketing Manager, Side Effects Software Inc.

  • ferrox

    they dont care about that,3dbuzz is also using non-commercial version in all their training.

  • http://varomix.net varomix

    Hi Guys

    @lloyd I have do something similar in Maya using python, but of course, is not as easy as it is on Houdini, and not as flexible, of course, since I did that Maya experiment in Python it might be possible to do it in XSI, also XSI has ICE and that can totally be used for that, I bet is easy, unfortunately I don’t have XSI, I don’t really know max script so I can’t tell if it’s possible in max.

    About using the Apprentice edition for the tutorial, I talked to SideFX and they said is OK, so, don’t worry about that and download it, is an awesome tool to learn, and it has everything the Master version of Houdini has.

    Enjoy the tut

  • Anglish

    Nice tutorial, you don’t learn just how to do it, but where to look for problems that may happen, and that’s the best way to learn.

  • http://www.3dtotal.com Memo

    Hi.

    People can not find Houdini false expectations.
    The tutorial lacks the thoroughness that is required when dealing with issues like this.

    What mean “Point sop?
    What is an attribute?
    What is an attribute in another system?
    There is nothing that can not be done with houdini not it?

    chss

  • Cristian Pop

    Nice tutorial!

    I never used Houdini, but it seem to be a really cool aplication.
    I really like to work procedurally, and when I saw your tut, I tried to create a similar effect in 3dsmax, with thinking particles.

    My result isn’t as complex as yours, but I think I’ve gotten a reasonable result :)

    Here is my result: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTt0D59k1F4

    Cheers!

    • http://varomix.net varomix
      Author

      Wow Cristian, that looks awesome, you really nailed the concept there, very nice work, now someone should try to do it in other apps, like Maya, XSI(yeah I still call it XSI :P) , Blender or any other, that’ll be awesome.

      @Memo, I did’t quite get what your talking about, but as I said in the tutorial, this sis not a beginners tutorial, you should have some Houdini knowledge and SideFX provides a very awesome help system, you can click the ? (question mark) on each node and have instant help about each one, local variables, there’s even examples in the help docs.
      And man, someone can write a very lengthy book about the PointSOP( Point Surface Operator), it´s applications are so diverse, in general the Point SOP give you access at point or vertex level, and there you can do bunch of things, move them, add color, normals, add custom attributes, query their position, etc

      I takes some getting used to Houdini, but once you do, there’s no turning back, I hope everyone gives it a try, hey, is free!!! and see why so many people love it, like me.

      Thanks

  • http://www.3dtotal.com mEmo!

    Thanks for you reply.

    to use houdini have to be really smart and all the help from all genius is undoubtedly of great importance.

    and Plis make more tutorials.

    my wish:

    Tutorials on: for each sop, for each chop, and all about “for each”..
    or vops….

    houdini is woooooww

    than again!

    • anon

      look at Peter Quint’s videos on vimeo he has a 3 part tutorial on the foreach sop…

  • m.abulazm

    Hey varomix :)

    thanks a lot for your effort. it is really nice to see more tutorials around for Houdini, I was thinking about the same idea but I have not started yet, so I think I will add more options to yours.
    well done and waiting for more.

    Cristian Pop, that’s cool could you tell us about the workflow for your 3dMax version.

    cheers

  • zarti

    half of the video was spent on ‘ hunting unpredictable errors ‘ .

    on those occasions i was lost .

    you could have cut / edited those parts

    or the tute could have been prepared better in advance to avoid such things .

    but , anyway thank you for your efforts …

    .cheers

    • Houdini_lover

      A best tutorial must deal with how to run into problems and fix them. If not, once you start working on your own and run into the very same problems you seam not to like in this tutorial, you would then beg for another tutorial that explains how to fix them or stuck and quit houdini.

      Varomix , please make sure you always include mistakes and their fix in your tutorials…and thank you for helping us understand and learn HoudiniFX.

      NIce job!

  • http://good mohammad afshari

    thanks a lot for your effort

  • http://www.facebook.com/dennis.volkerts Dennis Volkerts

    Im a little familiar with Houdini now but i cant see my normals on the curve in h12. Tried everything… Even looked in my display options… Anyone?