Hi Guys,

I'm brand NEW to Houdini and come from a Cinema 4D background. I downloaded the latest version of apprentice and I can't seem to see anything when I render my scene, It's just a BLACK window.

I have a sphere, a light pointing at it and a plane. I've tried the quck render button and adding a mantra module, but nothing. Could someone please help me out. All my render settings are default.

3DBuzz have a short “How do I…” video for setting up a basic render that may be useful - http://www.3dbuzz.com/vbforum/sv_video.php?v=1004 [3dbuzz.com]

Any FREE advice?

Can you post a hip file…

I have attached the file for you to check.

Your file works fine for me.

H9.5.134
Vista64
nvidia 8800gt

What are you specs?

If you hit “d” with the mouse over the mplay window to bring up the Display Options there might be some settings there that might have an affect, but not sure…

Crap! I dunno what's going on. My Specs are 9.5134, Radeon X1600, Vista 32bit.

How long does that scene take to render on your machine?

Historically Radeon cards and Houdini have never got on. I'm not sure what the latest is though, but I believe people are having some joy. Search here (or odforce) for Catalyst - I'm sure there's a remedy somewhere for this??

Damn that sucks! I have a notebook with an 8600gt card in it, i'll try and install apprentice on that. You've been more than helpful, Thanks.

I'm having a bit trouble understanding the problem here. Where is this black window? In mplay?

Yes in Mplay (it doesn't render anything at all)

Try doing File > Save and save it to something like mypic.jpg and then try loading it up in another app. Does that work?

Try disabling the firewall too. Sometimes people mistakenly block mplay.

I rendered a .tif file, opened it in photoshop and everything looks fine. The firewall isn't blocking mplay. I wonder what the hell is going on!

benandaim
I rendered a .tif file, opened it in photoshop and everything looks fine. The firewall isn't blocking mplay. I wonder what the hell is going on!

By default, Houdini will render to 16-bit floating point images.

It could be that your graphics drivers have issues displaying 16-bit float images natively.

You can do one of two things:

1) In an output driver, change the quantization to 8 bit integer (or 32 bit float)
2) In mplay, the preferences I think, there are options for Video Card preferences. In there, choose “Maximum compatibility” (or something like that). Just make sure the “Always display images as 8-bit integer” is turned on.

I don't have access to Houdini at the moment, so the wording of the options might be different.

I installed apprentice on my laptop and WA-LA no issues rendering. Maybe it's simply the ATI card it doesn't like on my desktop.

Is it just me or is the H renderer fairly slow, I've heard that C4D has a fast renderer & that's what i'm used to.

benandaim
I installed apprentice on my laptop and WA-LA no issues rendering. Maybe it's simply the ATI card it doesn't like on my desktop.

Is it just me or is the H renderer fairly slow, I've heard that C4D has a fast renderer & that's what i'm used to.

Don't judge any renderer on grid & ball scene base. Mantra is not very responsive if you compare it with freelance tools like Modo or C4D. Yet it's externally robust and powerful once you face a real challenge.

Mantra simply wasn't designed to make you feel it's fast. It's flexible and really fast in times other tools leave you in trouble.

OK cool, good explanation!