• Image formats (pic is Houdini’s native image format)

• Geometry formats (geo/bgeo is Houdini’s native geometry format)

• Scene description formats (for renderers)

• Channel/audio formats

External formats are implemented by standalone converter programs piped to Houdini. Internal formats are built into Houdini. Internal formats are slightly faster. You can create new external formats without using the Houdini Developer’s Kit.

If you have a format that you would like to be able to read and/or write, you can write a converter from your file format to the equivalent native Houdini format and/or a converter from the equivalent native format to your format. Then, add an entry to the appropriate IO table in $HFS/houdini/support. The converter program can appear anywhere in the Houdini search path.

Each line of an I/O table file contains the filename suffix, the command to read the custom format (in quotes), and the command to write the custom format (in quotes). Use %s to represent the filename in the quoted commands.

Future formats will be added using this method.