Thought I'd share this just in case somebody else has the same issue and can't solve it with anti-aliasing settings (or doesn't know how, like me ). I had the same problem with an .obj imported from Maya: when I assigned a material in Houdini it came out checkered. I just had to put zero in the Specular Anisotropy, in the Reflect/Base/Reflect Lights tab. Probably not the best solution but hey, it worked for me.