Esther Posted February 27, 2012 Share Posted February 27, 2012 Hello my name is Esther Zuidgeest a freshly graduated student in Game visuals. I'd like to present my houdini project here. What the project is about: The system I've build in Houdini can produce an infinite amount of different spiders. On top of that, each one of those spiders can be dynamically edited into the shape you want it to be. It is best demonstrated in this video: VIDEO How can this be implemented in games? This spider generator can also be build as a system that generates different varieties of trees, rocks, enemies or whole levels together with uv layouts and even textures. Once the system is build, it will give infinite variations without an effort. Documentation on the project:Procedural Spider Document Like my work? Here is my portofolio website: www.estherzuidgeest.nl I'm currently looking for a job. If you have questions, please ask! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Macha Posted February 28, 2012 Share Posted February 28, 2012 That's cool, I like it! How about you go a step further and evolve them! I'm not sure what the best way would be... uhmmm... you need a set of inheritable properties that are battling each other (oh, say heat absorption and moisture retention), some environmental conditions (areas exposed to sun and moisture), a way to randomize those properties, a way to inherit those properties, and a foreach loop! I dunno really, but it would be fun to try it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daniel.phillis Posted February 28, 2012 Share Posted February 28, 2012 cool ! i dig spiders. I want to see a hoard of different ones running and jumping over each other ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ben Posted February 28, 2012 Share Posted February 28, 2012 Yeah, nice project! What about adding a smart rig, send some rays, and special chops extra care Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pclaes Posted February 28, 2012 Share Posted February 28, 2012 Fun spiders! What about adding a smart rig, send some rays, and special chops extra care This is quite tricky to pull off! I tried a couple of times - you really need to build custom AI and collision detection - and if you want to get it real time I think the only way to go about it is with hdk. It is also tricky because it needs to be inside of a feedback environment, which means dops or sopsolver. Perhaps you can drive it with chops, but my understanding of chops is too limited. Try doing it even with a single walking leg that adapts and reacts to the terrain it walks on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest mantragora Posted February 29, 2012 Share Posted February 29, 2012 Yeah, nice project! What about adding a smart rig, send some rays, and special chops extra care If you looking for something like this, you are looking on the wrong forum. Game Development is the way to go. Overall game industry is much more exciting than VFX. You got everything there. I would start by looking at AIGameDev. Guy from link above does have account there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Esther Posted March 11, 2012 Author Share Posted March 11, 2012 That's cool, I like it! How about you go a step further and evolve them! I'm not sure what the best way would be... uhmmm... you need a set of inheritable properties that are battling each other (oh, say heat absorption and moisture retention), some environmental conditions (areas exposed to sun and moisture), a way to randomize those properties, a way to inherit those properties, and a foreach loop! I dunno really, but it would be fun to try it. It would be possible to study which environments produce which spiders. Then the user could input variables of the environment and a suitable spider pops out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Esther Posted March 11, 2012 Author Share Posted March 11, 2012 cool ! i dig spiders. I want to see a hoard of different ones running and jumping over each other ! I was just thinking that i could add locaters in Houdini which i read out in maya and write a mel script which would generate a suitable rig for the spider. That way i could have procedurally generated spiders with the apropriate rig and while we're at it possible a procedural animation. Interesting ^^ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carstenkolve Posted March 12, 2012 Share Posted March 12, 2012 Hi, very nice procedural setup! I'd try modifying a houdini rig the same way, rather than going via maya (it should be easier, and help you not do double up on a lot of code). Here a small example on something I did many years ago - it was fun (sorry for the crappy quality, it was the olden days) Here some details on the procedural walking system (it's simple but could get you started) http://kolve.blogspot.com.au/search/label/Maya%20Tutorials Yeah - it's done in Maya, too - but i I'd do it again, I'd probably try it in houdini :-) Carsten I was just thinking that i could add locaters in Houdini which i read out in maya and write a mel script which would generate a suitable rig for the spider. That way i could have procedurally generated spiders with the apropriate rig and while we're at it possible a procedural animation. Interesting ^^ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Visual Cortex Lab Posted March 12, 2012 Share Posted March 12, 2012 Yeah, nice project! What about adding a smart rig, send some rays, and special chops extra care that is so cool!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Esther Posted March 18, 2012 Author Share Posted March 18, 2012 Hi, very nice procedural setup! I'd try modifying a houdini rig the same way, rather than going via maya (it should be easier, and help you not do double up on a lot of code). Here a small example on something I did many years ago - it was fun (sorry for the crappy quality, it was the olden days) Here some details on the procedural walking system (it's simple but could get you started) http://kolve.blogspot.com.au/search/label/Maya%20Tutorials Yeah - it's done in Maya, too - but i I'd do it again, I'd probably try it in houdini :-) Carsten Interesting tutorial! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pclaes Posted March 19, 2012 Share Posted March 19, 2012 I would start by looking at AIGameDev. Thanks for this, very interesting stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FrederikP Posted September 25, 2012 Share Posted September 25, 2012 Hi Esther, came across this post by accident very nice work! I already read your spider paper a while back as part of the class materials. Very cool. Groetjes, Frederik Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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