Final ProjectHoudini
Houdini (Apprentice Edition)
• Download from https://www.sidefx.com/download/
• install run etc
• need to create account
https://www.sidefx.com/download/
Loading OBJ
Loading OBJ
hover mouse and hit ‘tab’
Loading OBJ
Loading OBJ
hover mouse and type ‘file’
Loading OBJ
Loading OBJ
click ‘File’
Loading OBJ
this thing appears,
click it
Loading OBJ
now this thing
appears
Loading OBJ
double click it
Loading OBJ
Loading OBJ
Loading OBJ
this will let you tell it where to load obj files from
Loading OBJ
click it
Loading OBJ
choose dir to find obj,
e.g. teapot.obj
Loading OBJ
click it
Loading OBJ
Making a flip book• you need to load a directory of obj’s
• put all of the obj files in the directory
• need a naming convention like ‘file_0.obj’, ‘file_1.obj’, ‘file_2.obj’ etc.
• you can then animate these using “flipbook”
Loading OBJs
this will let you tell it where to load obj files from
Loading OBJs
click it
Loading OBJs
choose dir to find obj,
e.g. teapot.obj
Loading OBJs
the objs, click it
Loading OBJs
Loading OBJs
Making a flip book
• you need to load a directory of obj’s
• put all of the obj files in the directory
• need a naming convention like ‘file_0.obj’, ‘file_1.obj’, ‘file_2.obj’ etc.
• you can then animate these using “flipbook”
Making a flip book
click this little flip book icon
Making a flip book
these are the start and end frames for
the flip book
Making a flip book
you can watch this like a movie by
clicking play once it’s generated
Rendering
• the last flip book is with OpenGL level quality
• you can render it more realistically with Houdini
• this can be done in the following sequence of events: improve sharp normals, add material property to objs, add ground plane, add lighting, set camera angle, render
Rendering• improve sharp normals
• add material property to objs
• add ground plane
• add lighting
• set camera angle
• render
Normals
double click on the obj node
Normals
now hit tab the type “normal” to add a normal processing
node
Normals
now a normal node will appear
Normals
click the bottom of the file node and connect it to the
normal node
Normals
click on the normal node, then click the tab at the right (in blue) to turn it on
Normals
now adjust the angle threshold slider, it treats
edges below it as sharp
Normals
Notice the edges are sharp now
Rendering• improve sharp normals
• add material property to objs
• add ground plane
• add lighting
• set camera angle
• render
• you can render your obj as plastic, glass, metallic etc
• if you want to make it look like “jello” you can use glass
• this is a little more expensive to render though, you can use plastic for a quicker turn around
Material properties
Material properties
Back out of the file node by clicking
“obj”
Material properties
Now click on “materials pallete”
Material properties
Let’s choose plastic: click it and drag to window at
right
Material properties
Let’s choose plastic: click it and drag to window at
right
Material properties
Now click it to examine properties
Material properties
For example adjust color
• next you need to tell the file/obj node that it should render with the plastic material as you set it up
• you have to click on the file node to do this
Material properties
Material properties
click on /shop to go back to node view
Material properties
click on shop tab to reveal obj option, this will bring you back to node view
Material properties
now click on the material tab to
reveal plastic as an option
Material properties
now click on this icon to reveal the material choices
Material properties
choose plastic and accept
Rendering• improve sharp normals
• add material property to objs
• add ground plane
• add lighting
• set camera angle
• render
Ground Plane (Grid)
• adding a ground plane makes the rendering look a little more realistic
• this is a “grid” node in Houdini
• you can create it by hitting tab the typing “grid”, similar to the creation of the “file” node used for objs
Ground Plane (Grid)
Ground Plane (Grid)
enlarged lower right
Ground Plane (Grid)
enlarged lower right
Ground Plane (Grid)
• double click the “grid” node to modify it’s size, e.g. set to 100X100 (default is 10X10)
• then exit back to “obj” view to see all the nodes
• then modify the height of the grid (e.g. shift y by -.7)
Ground Plane (Grid)
double click grid node then modify
size
Ground Plane (Grid)
click on obj to exit grid node to see the other nodes
Ground Plane (Grid)
now shift plane down in the y
direction to make some room for the
object
Rendering• improve sharp normals
• add material property to objs
• add ground plane
• add lighting
• set camera angle
• render
Lighting
• a simple version of this is to add an environment light
• this is like an ambient light that has no obvious source but lights everything up nearly equally
• you can add it from the obj view by clicking tab then typing “environment”
Lighting
click tab, then type “environment”
Rendering• improve sharp normals
• add material property to objs
• add ground plane
• add lighting
• set camera angle
• render
Camera Angle
• click and drag in scene window to move the object around until you get an angle you’d like to render/create the flip book from
• click in upper right of the scene window on the “cam” tab
• click “new camera” to save this viewing angle
Camera Angle
position for viewing then save camera
view
Rendering• improve sharp normals
• add material property to objs
• add ground plane
• add lighting
• set camera angle
• render
Rendering
• you can preview the render by clicking on the render window tab
Camera Angle
the “render view” tape is here
Rendering
click here to render
click here to choose your saved
camera view
Rendering
it will look like this as it converges
Rendering
by default it renders vertices as sphere (this doesn’t look good)
Rendering
• to modify this, we have to go back to obj window and modify the rendering geometry settings in the file node
• click the node, look for render option tab
• select the geometry tab
• select “no point rendering”
Rendering
select no point rendering
Rendering
now it renders the surface triangles instead of the points
Rendering
• to create a rendered flip book, click on the obj bar above the obj window
Rendering
click on “out”
Rendering
tell it to render a range of
frames
Rendering
tell it to render to frame 120
(or whatever is your final
frame)
Rendering
you have to delete
channels to do this
Rendering
then click Render to Play
and wait