grayOlorin

He... sorry for late to the party on this discussion...! as a user of both programs I would have to agree that there is a very huge potential of having a Houdini engine integration on 3D coat. Like Aabel said, such an implementation would make it very easy for anyone to develop new "model" generators, depending on how the implementation is done. To clarify, the Houdini engine API, in its current state, is a "geometry generator" (although you can use to statically trigger renders and image generation behind the scenes that output to files instead of to the host application). The high level concept is that the host application (i.e. 3D coat) provides "hooks" to pass geometry information into the API libraries for processing, then be able to fetch a geometry processed by the API. The processing happens via "Digital Assets", which are encapsulations of functionality into a single module (which is, at its core, one of the main strengths of Houdini). Think of it as a generic data compositor, where the data processing is done via a combination of stock and scripted node networks, then encapsulated into a single node. The Houdini engine hooks allow the host application to load these "digital assets" as if they were native plug ins for live processing of geometrical data (either by providing a geometry input or simply generating geometry parametrically). Depending on how the connections are made between the host and the API, the implementation can take many forms to best fit the host application philosophy (i.e. in the case of 3DC, the digital asset parameters would become a "tool" ui, volumes could be an input and an output thanks to the Vox layers, etc) Where this can be very powerful in 3D apps is that often, having some kind of parametric generator to start a model can be VERY useful (in addition to a means to process an existing model to, for example, add noises, effects, etc.) I think a good example of a digital asset is Kim Goossens road generator, which uses a single curve to generate a road based on rules (many of the 3DC tools can use curves as a parametric input.. there are very obvious parallels which can be drawn to some of these examples): here is a very simple example of how to create a digital asset in Houdini (oldie but gets to the point) in addition to the houdini engine running in unity (for a 3DC implementation, imagine similar concepts but more focused on setting up models for sculpting or adjusting sculpted models) http://www.indieprotools.com/videos/ I feel this could be a huge advantage for 3D coat as it would be the first hires sculpting app to allow for such quick tool prototyping and development (i think you would have a lot of digital asset developers wanting to demo their tools in a hi res modeling app)

hey guys, a few days ago sidefx announced their Houdini Engine, a standalone api version of Houdini that can run on other DCC apps http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2525&Itemid=66 They are currently working on a maya and unity plugin, but was thinking how incredibly awesome would be to be able to use houdini digital assets in a hi res sculpting program such as 3D Coat...! (i.e. a creature generator to quickly generate a low res creature model to sculpt on, a city generator to quickly add a background to your scene, etc). They are also holding a forum on which people can vote (or call out) which apps they would like to see a plug in for: http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_forum&Itemid=172&page=viewtopic&t=29122 I remember when pilgway released the Houdini app I was very excited...! I think this could be very exciting too

thank you guys! I will give it a whirl!

Hi, I am in the middle of doing some adjustements to a retopo mesh, and noticed that the snap to point of the add / split retopo tool is very sensitive. In many cases, I want to split an edge, but the tool will snap on either point at the ends of the edge I want to snap without letting me divide the edge. Is there a parameter to tune the sensitivity? thank you!

Thank you Abn! I will give it a shot. I feel the realtime displacement map will most likely work for my purposes

hi, I was wondering if there was a way in 3D coat to do sculpting layers while working on voxel mode. For example, say I have a layer that is a head, and I have modeled all medium frequency detail, and I want to add high frequency detail as a separate sculpting layer, so I can toggle high frequency detail on and off, adjust its intensity, etc. So far I really love sculpting in 3D Coat (it's amazing how easy it is to pick up!), but this seems to be the one thing I cannot find.... Thank you in advance!

Please implement freezing in voxel mode. It would come quite handy with the move tool!

Would be nice if one could scale the brushes in a non proportional fashion (i.e. taller, squishier) without having to load a separate alpha. This parameter could be exposed in the brush Options palette as brush scale X, brush scale Y