henderthing Posted October 20, 2005 Share Posted October 20, 2005 This may be a silly question--but still has me stumped. I built a small SOP subnet with a vex network in it that I'd like to standardize as my own little tool. But I'd like it to just be a SOP subnet. Is there a clever way to have a toggle that allows me to display geometry that helps me use the SOP? In other words, I can have a switch sop that turns on a templated or footprinted node, but that node will never be visible unless i'm "inside" my subnet. I can have the same switch on my guide geometry and merge it with the real output geometry, but that makes the output of the SOP incorrect for it's context in the scene (all the extra "guide" geometry is being output as well...) For bigger assets that involve multiple objects, this is obviously not a problem, but I'd really like to just have my little sop. Surely someone has done this many times... ? -m Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sibarrick Posted October 21, 2005 Share Posted October 21, 2005 You seem to have answered your own question, just have a switch sop that is footprinted and link a menu to it on the top level of your asset, then when you footprint the asset it will footprint the sop that is currently selected by the switch sop. What's wrong with the way you have it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
henderthing Posted October 21, 2005 Author Share Posted October 21, 2005 I'm probably missing something really stupid here, but... The problem is that footprinted/templated nodes that are inside of a subnet, are not visible. With the current setup, my controls are all on the top level (subnet) node, including "make guide geometry visible". But to actually see the footprinted/templated geometry, I must enter into the subnet----not very elegent, as I've just left my controls behind! -m You seem to have answered your own question, just have a switch sop that is footprinted and link a menu to it on the top level of your asset, then when you footprint the asset it will footprint the sop that is currently selected by the switch sop. What's wrong with the way you have it? 22039[/snapback] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michael Posted October 21, 2005 Share Posted October 21, 2005 I don't think there is a way to do what you're looking for in Houdini without doing something in the HDK... obj level yes...but not sop level. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
henderthing Posted October 21, 2005 Author Share Posted October 21, 2005 That's sad...I can think of so many little SOP tools that could benefit from this kind of functionality--but having to put them on object level would compromise their handiness... sigh. -m I don't think there is a way to do what you're looking for in Houdini without doing something in the HDK...obj level yes...but not sop level. 22065[/snapback] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michael Posted October 21, 2005 Share Posted October 21, 2005 maybe an RFE for allowing users to specify guide geometry for sop OTLs.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mtucker Posted October 21, 2005 Share Posted October 21, 2005 You could have a parameter on your subnet that controls whether your guide/footprint geometry gets merged into the real geometry... The obvious downside is that the "guide" geometry will be rendered as well as appearing in te viewport, so you'll have to remember to turn off the guide geometry before rendering. But at least you could see it in the viewport. As for real guide geometry in SOP assets, there already is an RFE for that (courtesy of Jason). Mark Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
henderthing Posted October 21, 2005 Author Share Posted October 21, 2005 That was my first solution...but the output stream is then invalid. The guide geometry will muck up anything downstream with data that does not belong. I could put it into a group, then delete the group downstream--but I'd really like to have a tool that just works, and doesn't require additional precautions for its use. Forgive my ignorance--RFE==feature request? If so--add me to the list! -m You could have a parameter on your subnet that controls whether your guide/footprint geometry gets merged into the real geometry... The obvious downside is that the "guide" geometry will be rendered as well as appearing in te viewport, so you'll have to remember to turn off the guide geometry before rendering. But at least you could see it in the viewport.As for real guide geometry in SOP assets, there already is an RFE for that (courtesy of Jason). Mark 22068[/snapback] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edward Posted October 21, 2005 Share Posted October 21, 2005 A really ugly hack is to have a button on the OTL called "show guide geometry" which creates a subnet which object merges the guide geometry with its template flag turned on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sibarrick Posted October 22, 2005 Share Posted October 22, 2005 You seem to have answered your own question, just have a switch sop that is footprinted and link a menu to it on the top level of your asset, then when you footprint the asset it will footprint the sop that is currently selected by the switch sop. What's wrong with the way you have it? 22039[/snapback] Sorry, confusing typo there, what I meant to say was... "...just have a switch sop that is displayed...." Got a bit carried away with my footprints there. But I also misunderstood what you need, you want to be displaying your subnet and then when templating it you see some other bit of geometry that isn't the same as the normally displayed bit. There are two nasty hacks around this, one is partly mentioned in this thread, merge the geometry together and display that, BUT make sure you create groups first so that you can remove the "template" bit first before passing it on to the rest of your network. Second way is when you have several subnets that work together, then you can use an object merge to grab the sop that you want straight into the appended subnet, that way it doesn't matter what is displayed and you don't have the overhead of mergeing all the geometry together. The downside is you can't insert any other sops in between your subnets. I use this method a lot when writing "sop systems". I would love to see templates and footprints respected by assets as an option and to have multiple outputs that would help too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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