hi,

Well I decided to learn houdini, so i could take advantage of fluid simulations and all the dynamics mumbo jumbo. so i'm playing around with it doing tutorials and such. and now know my way around some of the basic areas of it.

Currently i use c4d for everything, and am wondering about the workflow to an from c4d. Currently want to try something simple, for eg:

1 make some objects in c4d, like plane with extrusions and some boxes.
2 import em into houdini (know how to do that, obj apparantly, using low res)
3 throw em into a liquid simulation, run it, caches automatically (really handy)
4 import the fluid and objects back into c4d ( no idea how to do this) for rendering.

any help greatly appreciated.

For step 2, have you tried FBX?

dont have any problem with step 2 as really i just need everything as proxies for the simulation.

its step 3 that's giving me trouble.

I'm not sure I understand. For step 3, you just need to learn how to use Houdini, right? eg. http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1301&Itemid=132 [sidefx.com]

yeah, my main problem is step 4. i cant seem to get a fluid mesh back into c4d. i mean i don't need anything complex, no interactivity, just the changing mesh.

Personally, I'd say try Mantra.

But if you must, can't you just export .obj files from Houdini and load them into c4d?

Part 4: I've exported particles and geometry to C4d from Houdini using the Realflow plugins, it's pretty easy and works fine.

Having said that I'd second Edward's suggestion of rendering in Mantra.

realflow plugin? Ok i'll give it a go.

Mantra does look great, but it doesnt seem to be too snappy, and not really keen on learning another whole render engine at the moment.

you guys know if mantra doesnt Flicker during Gi animation by default, or are there also setting you have to play with? i googled it, but couldn't find any mention of mantra and flicker.

Just a note: be sure to read the instructions for the Realflow plugin on the C4d side as the way it works is NOT intuitive. If you get stuck feel free to post and I'll try to help.

I can't speak to the Mantra GI settings as I don't use GI.

AlekseyR
realflow plugin? Ok i'll give it a go.
you guys know if mantra doesnt Flicker during Gi animation by default, or are there also setting you have to play with? i googled it, but couldn't find any mention of mantra and flicker.

When doing GI with PBR you get fast renders and beautiful bounces. Denoizeing the images is just a matter of upping the samples - which has a fairly linear affect on rendertimes.

AlekseyR
realflow plugin? Ok i'll give it a go.

Mantra does look great, but it doesnt seem to be too snappy, and not really keen on learning another whole render engine at the moment.

you guys know if mantra doesnt Flicker during Gi animation by default, or are there also setting you have to play with? i googled it, but couldn't find any mention of mantra and flicker.

If you're getting flickering with your GI renders in c4d, you need to set your irradiance cache file to lock and auto load or choose IR or IR QMC (camera animation). I find the former works best for tiff sequences where you may not be rendering all in one go. Otherwise if you have moving lights it needs to be set to full animation. This will clear up any flickering.

Doesn't c4d r14 support alembic? Never really had a flickering issue with Mantra.

sl0throp
Doesn't c4d r14 support alembic?

it does, but keep in mind that this is thread revival from 2009

doh…