Hey SideFX.

Are there any plans for you team to start doing some kind of podcast? I'd love to listen to it! I always tune into zBrushes podcasts and think they're so interesting, and would love it if you guys had something like that too!

There is the webex webinars: https://www.sidefx.com/education/illume-webinars/ [sidefx.com]

There are at the moment no podcast from sesi.

What you can do is a RFE

What sort of content would you like to see (hear) in a Houdini podcast? Podcast content can't rely on visuals, (though there can be links to images in show notes), so that plays a big role in determining what would/wouldn't work in the format. I suppose a Bob Ross style “The Joy of Houdining” could be good as a relaxing sleep aid, but I'm guessing you had something a bit different in mind.

I just started listening to podcasts a couple years ago, (Hello Internet, Dear Hank & John, a few podcasts on Relay.fm, etc.), and I've thought about making one of my own about low-level C++ programming, though I definitely don't have the time at the moment.

fxguide could be a good template, largely interview based, talk with artists in studios about work they've just finished, or chats with the sidefx devs/tds about features they're working on. more conversational, less rehearsed than then webinars.

It think it would be cool to have some guests come by and tell their story. I always find that stuff really interesting. Even though its a visual program, I think everyone that uses Houdini has some kind of interesting story about it.

Things like how they got into Houdini, how it changed the way they work and just their thoughts on topics related to VFX. The guys at pixologic handle it pretty well, considering zBrush is a purely visual program they keep things really interesting.

Massive +1 for this. I'm just getting into Houdini and this type of content is gold when it comes to accelerating your learning and staying current with industry/software developments. You can put it on in the background whilst you're at work or the gym etc and learn a ton just though listening to casual conversations. Some great examples of CG and art related podcasts that do this really well are :

CG Garage
The Collective Podcast
Brograph Motion Graphics Podcast
Greyscalegorilla Podcast
The iAnimate.net Podcast
The Allan McKay Podcast

It'd be a total godsend for me right now for sure! Houdini is technical beast!

+1
I would absolutely love to see some podcasts about houdini stuff. I did found one podcast for some time. Here is the link…

http://www.schoolofmotion.com/an-interview-with-the-brilliant-chris-hendryx/ [schoolofmotion.com]

If you know some more please share
Always nice to listen to some houdini content on my way to work.

jon

and I've thought about making one of my own about low-level C++ programming

If this was done in the context of HDK, it might open up and encourage people to explore that aspect of Houdini.

I've briefly looked at the HKD docs ( including the getting started section ), and it seems like it's simple enough for people to at least get their feet wet.

I for one think it's enough ( HDK docs ) that I could dive in and come up with something however simple, having done some small c console programs with MinGW.

But I wonder if maybe some people who only have say scripting backgrounds ( meaning they have a sense for logic/algorithms but not the whole aspect of compiling and context of doing this for Houdini) might benefit from some kind of additional podcast/tutorial/webinar series. ( C++ and HDK )

I think a forum topic on this alone might be a good idea ( C++ / HDK ). But judging from the number of questions I do see already from time to time, they tend to be sparse which suggests to me it's not an area many explore.

Which is why I think podcasts/masterclass tuts/webinars might be a good way as I've said before to encourage more use of this aspect of Houdini.

BabaJ

ndickson
and I've thought about making one of my own about low-level C++ programming

If this was done in the context of HDK, it might open up and encourage people to explore that aspect of Houdini.

It may be difficult to make something like that in a podcast format. Short tutorial videos walking through aspects of comprehensive HDK example code and why it's done in a certain way would probably be easier to follow. A podcast might be good later on for more general discussion of ideas, but I've found it's hard to think about specifics in audio-only.

BabaJ
…it seems like it's simple enough for people to at least get their feet wet.

We're currently working on getting CMake support for HDK examples, so that, for example, on Windows, you can generate a Visual Studio project and use that. It's partly working in the development build, so hopefully we can get it backported to 16.0 eventually. We've also just gotten the new verb SOP workflow working in an HDK example in the development build, which simplifies setting up and accessing parameters, and lets people use the SOPs in compiled blocks or in Python, so hopefully that can make it into 16.0 as well.

Either way, these sorts of things may help reduce some of the complexity of getting started with and working with the HDK.

Something simlar to Ue4 would be cool - but maybe shorter and more to the point. I don't like audio only, something like the new modo livestream would be great (replaces modcast for me):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEjGk5CZiWA&t=523s [youtube.com]