melany Posted November 14, 2003 Share Posted November 14, 2003 hi everyone, how can I create a glowing light in houdini object mode? I created a dammy lamp and textured it with a transparent glass shader. Then i put a cone light inside it, but it looks black eventhough the lamp is transparent. IIT DOES NOT GLOW! how can i make the light visible?Would it be better to do the glow in the compositing?? Threre must be I way to do it. in houdini.... thank you melanie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tallkien Posted November 14, 2003 Share Posted November 14, 2003 The Glow will need to be done in post at the moment, however if your bulb too is transparent, then apply a vex supermat to the filament and crank up the emmision param Check out the Geometry and Geokey COPS for more info, they might make life a little easier Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deecue Posted November 14, 2003 Share Posted November 14, 2003 you know, this is often asked a lot and even wanted to be done by myself in the past. and i've always wondered why it hasn't been approached by people at sesi in trying to make a glow type shader or light. something as simple as the tail lights of car or the shade of a lamp. and i love the looks of photon generation and the new light instancing but it seems that this type of thing should be able to be done as easily as they are. it seems that it isn't that uncommon of a thing to see in the 3d world, but something very unapproachable in houdini. (except for post). any thoughts? dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edward Posted November 15, 2003 Share Posted November 15, 2003 Do you mean something like the Thin shader here? http://www.odforce.net/codex/shaders.php Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deecue Posted November 15, 2003 Share Posted November 15, 2003 ya know edward, i've had just about enough of your really good, simple, obvious, intelligent solutions to all my problems. i was also interested in have glowing lights and such.. not so much having objects that act as filters (i.e. a lamp shade) but more so as something that emits light in almost the same way an LED on an electronic object would. kinda like a concentrated amout of light from/near the object but not making everything light up all around it. much like you would see the tail lights of a car at night. all glowy and what not. maybe causing some reflection\illumination on the street, but its very concentrated on the light of the car and not turning everything behind it blaring red... on another note, how do you get the vfl's to be seen in houdini.. i compiled them with vcc and got my vex and ds file. put all three in to my houdini\vex\surface dir. and i was told to edit the SHOPsurface.vm file but i have a feeling thats all changed since 6 since there isn't one anymore. and it now seems as if a certain file needs to be created\put in to the SHOP[version#] dir in the houdini/config/dialogs dir. but i have no idea what file type that is (there is no extension on them) or how to get it. any enlightened ideas? thanks a bunch, dave p.s. oh and if the inter-net seems to make it unclear, i think there was some sarcasm in the post somewhere.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deecue Posted November 15, 2003 Share Posted November 15, 2003 well right after i posted the last message, i took a look at the lamp hip file along with that shader. it uses a generic surface shader with a mantra command line in the mantra param. i just pointed the command to my compiled .vex file and played with the diff and translucency values and it works great. but i know theres gotta be a way to get this to come up within houdini as one of the vex created shaders. somehow other than this. especially if i have my own file and want to add the shader to my own created object. must be a better way than through the mantra script in a gen_surface shader. dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stremik Posted November 15, 2003 Share Posted November 15, 2003 I'm a complete diletant in these things but... wouldn't an xray shader do the job? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deecue Posted November 15, 2003 Share Posted November 15, 2003 it might actually work for what im looking for but the only xray shader im aware of is the one at CAMF (http://www.camf.com/shaderlib.html).. and i haven't been able to test that out yet for the same reasons i was having trouble getting vfl's in to houdini 6. but as soon as i figure that out, i will be testing it asap. thanks, dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meshsmooth Posted November 16, 2003 Share Posted November 16, 2003 i asked this question of Michael Fuchs and got this responce...... I have been using Houdini for only 2 months so I am still stumbling about. I saw your vex materials on your site hoping to open them up and learn a thing or two but I haven Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stremik Posted November 16, 2003 Share Posted November 16, 2003 deecue. I have this tutorial by Andre Thomas on how to build an XRay shader in VOPs. It includes an example hip file, a bgeo human head and a pdf file. I don't remember where I downloaded it and I'm kinda don't feel it would be very ethical to post it here, I guess. If you want I can probably mail it to ya. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevenong Posted November 16, 2003 Share Posted November 16, 2003 Hi guys, Andre Thomas' tutorial is available over at Techimage's website. Click on the Houdini logo then "Techimage Houdini Tutorials". To install VEX OPerators in Houdini 6.0 & above, go to File -> New Operator Type..., give your VEX OPerator a name, label, select "VEX Type", "Network Type:" is "Surface Shader Operator". As for "Save To Library", you can leave it at its default but set "Install Library To" as $HOME/houdini6 or $HOME/houdini6.1. Next, you'll get a Operator Type Properties dialog, go to the VEX Code tab & copy-paste the VEX code here. Finally, click Apply & you have just installed a new VEX Surface Shader. I hope the above helps! Cheers! steven Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deecue Posted November 16, 2003 Share Posted November 16, 2003 meshsmooth: well i did compile the vfl's into vex and put it in my shader dir. but the problem is, houdini6 doesn't seem to have a SHOPsurface.vm file which is where i was having my problem. so i got the vex file and ready to go and can actually bring it in through a mantra script from a generic surface shader, but im wanting it to be a part of my shader list (which is where you would go in and edit the SHOPsurface.vm file). Have you been able to get vfl's in since h6? Does anyone have a h6 and a SHOPsurface.vm file? I wonder if i just created my own file with the appropriate text and named it to the .vm file? Will try that..... Stremik: Would love a copy actually. Please do email it to me if you feel comfortable in doing so. Thanks a lot. dquiru20@student.scad.edu Thanks guys, Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deecue Posted November 16, 2003 Share Posted November 16, 2003 Sweeeet. Thanks Steven. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edward Posted November 16, 2003 Share Posted November 16, 2003 Besides Steven's excellent suggestion, there's also a command line way to compile .vfl code into OTLs: http://www.sidefx.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1739 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meshsmooth Posted November 16, 2003 Share Posted November 16, 2003 The method I pasted I haven Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edward Posted November 16, 2003 Share Posted November 16, 2003 Anyone want to try a definitive answer on how to use the vex code we find on odforce for the FAQ? (Speaking of which, can we default the posts viewed to be from the beginning in that forum?) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deecue Posted November 17, 2003 Share Posted November 17, 2003 meshsmooth: the way you posted is not nearly as scary as you would have thought (even though it looks intimidating). first you would go to your command line tools app (it should be along with the other houdini set of program links (master, image viewer, geo viewer, hscript, etc). at the command prompt, go to the dir where your vfl is using the normal dos/unix commands. when at the dir, type: vcc -h nameofshader.vfl. press enter. close command line tool window. go to your dir where you had the vfl. now you will have the vfl, ds, and vex file. put the three of these in your houdini/vex/surface dir. (or your displacement dir if its a displacement shader). then edit your SHOPsurface.vm file with your choice of text editor. and add your shader to it by writing a string giving it's OP name, pointing it to the appropriate .ds file you just created, and finally giving it a label. i.e. op_name vex/Surface/nameofshader.ds -label "Shader Label" That's it. It really isn't as bad as it looks. But that was the pre 6 way of doing it. Now it's much easier by just doing the method that Steven and Edward have mentioned. Edward: what exactly do you think it should be? To me, both you and Steven explained it quite clearly.. Couldn't those just be used in the FAQ? Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edward Posted November 17, 2003 Share Posted November 17, 2003 Hmm ... I tried but it looks like an admin is needed to post something there? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tallkien Posted November 22, 2003 Share Posted November 22, 2003 The new Attribute transfer stuff in the user guide (6.1.200) gives me some ideas about things like car tail lamps casting light on the road and such Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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