I started looking through a website called ‘Lynda’ (https://www.lynda.com/Houdini-tutorials/Houdini-Essential-Training/571627-2.html?srchtrk=index%3a1%0alinktypeid%3a2%0aq%3ahoudini%0apage%3a1%0as%3arelevance%0asa%3atrue%0aproducttypeid%3a2) as it provides information on beginners using Houdini, however I felt that it wasn’t providing any information that made sense to me as I usually learn through a process where I can see an outcome, so found a youtube tutorial where I could visually learn how to create a simulation before I begin to learn the technicalities behind it.
To begin with, I want to create a simple simulation in Houdini in order to grasp the scope of the length each experiment may approximately take. As with my previous project I began by looking at rigid body and soft body simulations, I felt that I should follow a similar path as it slowly eased me into the software – hence looking at ‘soft jellies’ as this is similar to my bouncy ball simulation from my previous project.
When researching tutorials to follow I discovered there is little information out there that is straightforward to follow, this being said I found a youtube video that has a demonstration of how to do this kind of simulation.
I found this tutorial difficult to follow as it didn’t have any voice over, therefore with a couple of steps I had to work it out by myself with trial & experiment i.e. pressing certain keys, seeing whether there was any indication in my software that explained what to do etc.
The first step was to create a spherical object which was done after creating a geometry domain (essential for keeping object inside a certain area) and make sure that it is a polygon material. The image below is the stage I’m currently at, and to reach this stage I had to select the sphere tabs and change them to an ‘Organic Mass’ which ‘creates a solid finite element (FEM) object that is pliant and elastic, similar to muscle and fat’ (learnt after highlighting the OM tab) and copying and pasting each object so I eventually have three spheres on screen. To make the objects nodes expand and actually make the organic mass, I had to select the polygon and press enter on each object which also allowed me to put the OM into action and connect them together.
The following step was to add a ‘merge’ node so that I could connect the spheres together – this allowed me to see the three individual spheres through the viewport.
I then added a ‘cache’ to connect to the merging node, as without this my simulation would not move in the motion I desired.
I added a plane (so jelly balls collide)
Enter the ‘AutoDopNetwork’ node system to change the values of the objects so that they collide more naturally.
added a camera and a sun light (need to change to jelly material)
added material after following the instructions that sidefx provided http://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/ref/panes/materialpalette.html
Subdivide and surface smoother (different) 1. affects the whole geometry and is the reason to make things look more natural once rendered out – had to create a separate node in 2. only a temporary affect while editing and doesn’t change the rendered look.
My Jellies Final Output:
Frames Rendered: 200
Render Time: 4 Hours
One of the things I am struggling with is the size of the software being on my laptop as I feel that its fitting onto a small screen and therefore is more condensed, resulting in smaller tabs which makes it more difficult to see accurately what I am doing. I solved the interface issue by changing it in preferences and making it larger, this way, I am able to see what I’m doing with more precision.