cryprosporidium

thank you guys a lot! im not used so much to use expressions so far and i still got bit of a problem with syntax, so i tend to look for some kind of tool for everything (as used to from other 3d apps .-). but this is only a matter of time and your hints are very helpful. defining global paths via null is the way that im probably most comfortable with.

jordibares: yes, i have. your pdf`s were first i was reading and they were a huge help for first steps and understanding terminology. so thanks a lot ;-) anyway, houdini is much more technical and very different in many aspects than SI, so i probably need read through several times until i fully grasp it.

after about a month using H, i can say some UI features are just great and very practical. interface overally feels best out there. Mantra and lighting tools are superb. i was also working with some volumetrics and was surprised how fast i was able to get good looking results that i would never achieve using SI. so far, everything is great and overally i like it a lot for many reasons. BUT when it came to handling larger scenes with lots of objects and external files, this is where i hit the wall real hard this is a point im very anxious to resolve and find a good workflow to make the life easier. very typical scenario is when i have a scene done and want to do some changes to it - load different caches, change camera, save it as a new shot and render it. sounds simple, but unfortunatelly, i havent found any way how to view and edit all the caches or all textures used in the scene, (for example), other than manually search for them, clicking on each object separately and typing a new path for each of them. which is… when you have, say, few hundred entries to change… well, you get the picture saving the scene as a new shot into different folder (bcs we got folder per shot) turned out to be pretty bad idea too and took me another few hours of finding and fixing broken links to external files. im not sure if i just overlooked something, or this kind of tasks require completely different approach in Houdini? anyway, if you guys can share your workflows for this i will appreciate it greatly. also for those who are familiar with SI terminology, how would you substitute for things like External files manager? this are functionalities i miss badly in Houdini and i think it would not be too hard to implement? Data tree is virtually asking for it

How about DOPs? Im most curious about these.