RobertVari Posted September 18, 2012 Share Posted September 18, 2012 Hi, I've started to learn Houdini maybe a year ago. I know that most of you use it as an efficient tool for making procedural assets and dynamic simulations but I would like to show you how can I use it as a character artist. I'm really satisfied with it's rendering and shading abilities. In the future I would like to encourage more artists to try and use Houdini in their workflow. This is my Scorpion character in the middle of the texturing process 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abvfx Posted September 18, 2012 Share Posted September 18, 2012 Great work, are those procedural shaders on the chest piece? Either way it great stuff. Love to see him in an enviroment. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zarti Posted September 18, 2012 Share Posted September 18, 2012 Amazing !! i do share the same opinion as yours that houdini can be used not only for simulations . if you'd find some time and will to share your experience , id be very interested to read it here . .cheers -- p.s.: i get too exited when i see something non exploding or melting done with houdini . Ha- Haa ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
N!K Posted September 18, 2012 Share Posted September 18, 2012 Great Work! any chance on sharing this model... wink wink Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Netvudu Posted September 18, 2012 Share Posted September 18, 2012 great stuff! Are you creating custom shaders or using the default materials? I´m asking because I´m interested in improving my shading/texturing process in Houdini. I still find it a bit cumbersome, even if the final quality is clearly good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobertVari Posted September 19, 2012 Author Share Posted September 19, 2012 I'm glad you all like it I didn't use any procedural shaders. I like to paint my own textures, and on his chest, and all the other parts I used 2K textures. I'm using mostly four texture types, Diffuse, Displacement, Specular, and a glossy for controlling specular angle. I'm using the default Mantra surface, but I did few changes in it. I built in a tiling option and a color correction for both diffuse and specular textures. I also added the ability to control specular angle with a texture, as I mentioned above. I must say that, so far I'm really impressed by Mantra's speed and quality. I have an old quad core Intel and I did this renders under four minutes. I tried Mental Ray and V-ray as well but they were slow, especially in closeups and used a lot of memory. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dbukovec Posted September 19, 2012 Share Posted September 19, 2012 Great looking renders! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twelveplusplus Posted September 19, 2012 Share Posted September 19, 2012 yes, nice work! from what I've seen so far, Houdini is good for pretty much anything! I think the main reason there are so few people using Houdini for Character Design/animation is a lack of good training materials out there... wanna make a "how to make sub-zero in Houdini" training video for us? =) 12++ 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobertVari Posted September 20, 2012 Author Share Posted September 20, 2012 yes, nice work! from what I've seen so far, Houdini is good for pretty much anything! I think the main reason there are so few people using Houdini for Character Design/animation is a lack of good training materials out there... wanna make a "how to make sub-zero in Houdini" training video for us? =) Muhahaa Well maybe I would try You alright. There are plenty of tutorials about making procedural assets, fluid simulations and such things, which is quite understandable. Houdini is damn good in these things. In contrast, I couldn't find any tutorial about making characters or professional animations with it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobertVari Posted September 20, 2012 Author Share Posted September 20, 2012 I've finished his arms. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CeeGee Posted September 20, 2012 Share Posted September 20, 2012 Amazing work, realy nice rendering Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
altbighead Posted September 20, 2012 Share Posted September 20, 2012 Thanks for sharing this progress. I agreed about Houdini being more than just doing voodoo simulation stuffs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
siepiau Posted September 28, 2012 Share Posted September 28, 2012 Most impressive effort, Robert! The world could certainly use more training material for character work in Houdini. There is much power and potential in the software, but it's challenging to pick up as the node-based and procedural methodology is quite different from traditional character animation packages. Would you be so kind as to share a bit of your workflow with us? In particular I'm curious about: 1) Modeling - is the character modeled in Houdini? If not, what is your workflow for importing? 2) Texturing - are the UVs assigned using Houdini, or imported with the character geometry? 3) Rigging/Animation - do you plan to rig and animate the character inside Houdini? If not, do you have a workflow for applying character animation and rendering using Mantra? Sorry if I'm asking too many questions. Thank you and looking forward to more of your excellent work! ^^ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dyei nightmare Posted September 29, 2012 Share Posted September 29, 2012 the interesting question here is if textures and bump maps are procedural. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
leifdk Posted September 30, 2012 Share Posted September 30, 2012 amazing work mate keep it up Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobertVari Posted October 1, 2012 Author Share Posted October 1, 2012 I tried Houdini's modeling tools and I realized instantly that the modeling workflow and tools in Houdini, although quite similar to other modeling softwares, much more suitable for procedural modeling than making props or characters. Therefore I used my good old Maya and Zbrush workflow to model Scorpion. For making UV-s I use Unfold3D mostly. After I finished the models and all the UV works has been done I exported the model to OBJ format. I'm planing to create a rig for the character and use motion capture animation to breathe some life into it, but then I have to switch to alembic format, which according to my previous test, is quite easy to work with. All the textures on Scorpion are hand painted in Mudbox and Photoshop. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobertVari Posted October 2, 2012 Author Share Posted October 2, 2012 The last piece is on it's place. I finished texturing the swords. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dyei nightmare Posted October 3, 2012 Share Posted October 3, 2012 (edited) got it Edited October 3, 2012 by dyei nightmare Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobertVari Posted October 9, 2012 Author Share Posted October 9, 2012 I've finished the texturing. After a quick rigging here is the pose. Some deformations are still needs to be fixed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dyei nightmare Posted October 9, 2012 Share Posted October 9, 2012 are u rigging inside houdini? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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