Would be nice to have this limitation lifted for h15 even watermarked
There are quite a few indie users that will be quite happy to see support for their preferred engines . Octane, Arnold, maxwell etc :idea:

i don't want to make a flame-war or something like that but i don't think that this is technical possible. because the limitations of resolution as a example, the plugin developer of the renderer has to implement that limitation and that's out of control of sidefx. when the access is given of the 3rd party render the limit can be overcome when you make your own plugin.

If I could use my Arnold license with Houdini indie I would be soo happy. I do understand why they have the limitation though. But still, we can dream lol

Good point mandrake0, I hadn't thought of that issue. Still I would be happy to pay a higher subscription fee for an Indie version that didn't have this restriction.

Ben

Yeah, as much as I like Mantra, being able to use another renderer with indie would be so nice.

I sort of get the limitation, but I also think it's shortsighted a bit. I thought the idea behind indie is that it gives the power of Houdini to people who can't afford it.

Is the fear that if indie were unrestricted that company's would just purchase that instead of the main license, even if they don't qualify (make over 100k)? To me that's not a rational motive so I hope its something else (by this I mean you shouldn't make policies based on the behavior of cheaters).

I think opening up 3rd party plugins would bring in more users, which would push more studios to adopt it into their pipeline. Maybe sidefx should drop the resolution restriction altogether? I don't know, just some thoughts.

Agree it should be open, at least to GPU renderers. Indie is aimed at solo artists, Mantra is for studios with render-farms… makes no sense.

+1

Agreed that disabling plugin renderers is misguided. It's like putting child locks on the windows/doors from the outside but the cheaters all have keys…or something :?

Even allowing Houdini Indie to use free renderers (i.e. Non-Commercial Renderman, 3Delight, demo versions of other renderers, etc) would be great. Just opening up and relying on the honor system - which is really all you have anyway - would be best!

It would be great to have external renderer support for indie however if it would damage Houdini to allow external renderers in indie then I would prefer not having it. In any case I think SideFX should communicate with users regarding this.

it would be amazing, maybe have an indiepro version that allows it? Killing to play with octane, though I am sure mantra will carry on being my amin renderer.

I will buck the trend and say the following.

I would rather stay with mantra and get a deeper feature set and documentation that would show us how to get the features that we think we want from other renderers into houdini.

I feel the same way about Nuke and COPS…I would rather stay in COPs and not have to even consider NUKE…especially if both use Python.

I just see it as a better long range solution…and yes it does take a bit more intellectual inertia of setting up assets and getting everything centralized in your projects…but its still saves you loads in the long run…and if you are an Indie license owner like me…I don't want anymore software investments until I can get a full houdini license.

When I look at the Age of Ultron articles….and they did all that in mantra… I think that we need deeper documentation to tell us the INDIE userbase how to get that kind of workflow into our projects.

online tuts

on how to set up a tiled render

a universal primer on rendering in all its shapes and forms

same thing with Materials and Textures.

The documentation gives you the definitions in a clinical kind of vocabulary…but seeing how easy it is in another renderer does not mean it cannot be done in houdini's mantra/cops/rops…we just need a dedicated primer that is constantly updated.

if you look at greyscalegorillas site it is replete with tuts, articles and assets that really sell the cinema4d renderer. I think the same could be done for houdini…and again…this would mean a better profit margin for the indie developer.

@koyoteblack

The H15 release has some updates in the Shader and texture area that reduces some complex parts.

You can look at the übertage H15 Sneakpeek Video (at 38min): https://vimeo.com/140505036 [vimeo.com]

whats also there are some good tutorials for mantra(H12):
https://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogcategory&id=203&Itemid=362 [sidefx.com]
https://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2160&Itemid=344 [sidefx.com]

Paid Tutorials from Rohan Dalvi (Some Shader Tutorials): http://www.rohandalvi.net/home [rohandalvi.net]

If you have seen them and you find there are still missing parts please make a RFE or a new Post in the Learning Houdini section.

if you haven't seen them i wish you a wonderful HAPPY LEARNING :-)

Thank you for such a detailed and kind response.

Yes I have the Rohan Dalvi videos.

I think that was some of the best money I ever spent!

to be honest I am happy as a pig in shit with Houdini and Mantra…but I do know how hard it can be for others…I think it is due to the age we live in. Many of us(myself included) don't want to have to think our way around limitations. When you see some of the Math and programming the houdini is now capable of…and even more so in release 15…it's like the Neanderthal scene in 2001 with the monolith.(start the soundtrack)

The videos show you what is there…but the difference between a manual(text or otherwise) and a guide is similar to the difference between a calculator and a Math teacher.

The teacher(along with the textbook) guides you to a deeper understanding of the subject matter. The calculator is there so you dont spend all day and night doing one or two problems…indeed…with Houdini as the calculator you can do hundreds of problems…it is truly vast.

It was not always this way. There was a time when Houdini was 1.0…and mantra was just a baby.

Today there is so much information about various aspects of houdini…but let's face it…what people are asking for here is a freebie.

I think that if you want to render outside of houdini on an Indie license…then write out an obj sequence…otherwise commit to learning what is your eyes are after in the renderer you are desirous of…and build your own asset…or ask how to get that special aspect of the renderer into houdini…it could be something simple like learning how to instance your lights instead of using brute force GI….etc.

cheers!

what people are asking for here is a freebie

I think you're mistaking Indie with Apprentice.

Indie is aimed at solo artists, who usually won't have a render farm. Mantra requires a render farm (or heaps of time, or low quality results)… so requiring solo artists to render their projects exclusively with Mantra defeats the purpose of Indie.

I would like to see more work on Mantra, maybe add GPU support to speed up some parts of it … As with Indie you have only one render node, so if render times are high you can not utilize other machines (if you have them) to speed up render unless you buy one more Indie licenses (up to 3 ?). In my case on current project, I decided to purchase new graphic card for that amount of $ and speed up render times by 2, but had to move project to Blender. I think that with Redshift it could be even faster…

I am not sure though does Gridmarkets work with Indie too? Did not test them yet so not sure about costs there.

Mantra GPU render option would be amazing for the indie artists. Large scale projects would still prefer CPU but GPU accelerates small scale stuff immensely.

I'm personally a big fan of Mantra, and being a fully-Houdini-Indie 1-man-studio these days, it's essentially all I use now. That said, I'd love to have the option to use 3rd party renderers on occasion.

I understand the limitation… Indie is a LOT of 3D package for very little money, and it obviously needed clear boundaries for what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate use. Getting into the realms of 3rd party renderers is a situation that becomes difficult to place licensing limits on.


What I'd love to see in the future, perhaps, would be some kind of official “Indie” partnership initiative with the likes of Solid Angle / Chaos Group / etc, to perhaps create specific “Indie” branches of Arnold / Vray / etc, complete with their own licensing and coded limitations.

That way, Houdini Indie wouldn't be easily integrated into larger pipelines without breaking the licensing agreement, while still allowing select access to 3rd party renderers.

I imagine it'd be a LOT of work to set something like that up between two companies, but ya never know :-)