Top 5 Myths About Houdini 

would love a full course for Houdini from School of Motion!

0:45 My work here. 'Houdini' for sure deserves all the credits:) But would be nice to give a proper credits to the creators, thanks!

Houdini is amazing. But it is absolutely the hardest 3D program to learn. I remember being insanely frustrated with attempting to follow along with tutorials only to get to a point where the name of node has changed or its functionality was merged into another node or... something. Making any tutorials on previous version nearly impossible to follow along with.

This man is a legend. He's also completely correct on all of these myths. You can do so much in Houdini after learning a very little amount of it. That consistency is such a strong point of the workflow.

I started learning houdini 5-6 months ago and before that I used cinema 4d. One thing I can say is that, take your time while learning houdini. Don't rush it. Also it would be really good if you learn VEX, because believe it or not VEX will definitely make the work easier and at some points it will open more pathways for new explorations. Learn the fundamentals before jumping into dynamics and simulations. Learn how proceduralism works properly.

It would be great if school of motion would make a course for houdini!

I started in Maya a loooooong time ago. Then I went to C4D kicking and screaming, grew to love it. I've been dipping my toe in with Houdini and once you put in some time it's not nearly as intimidating as it first seems. It is a little mind blowing how much power they pack into the software. I wish School of Motion would have a Houdini course, there's so much information out there it would be nice to get a good foundational knowledge that every Houdini artist should be expected to have and also more advanced topics.

I'm a lead cg generalist. I worked with many fx artists and motion graphics artist, and literally all of them said: houdini is not easy to learn. This guy is the first one that says otherwise.

I agree on most points, however, Houdini might not be the hardest to learn, it does have the steepest learning curve. Most people that use maya (for ex) use it within one or two disciples; modeling, rigging and or animation and therefor the learning curve is capped at some point by the limitation of the DCC’s tools. Houdini on the other hand, is a different beast. Houdini artists are exposed to the very backend of the software and need to understand the fundamental basics of computer graphics if they want to properly manipulate geometry. (Example, I only cared about normals in Maya if the geo didn’t look right, in Houdini, Normals play a tremendous roll in how you manipulate your geo, cross and dot products, setting up velocities for sims…etc). it allows the user to have full control of every aspect of the procedural process. In most DCC’s, workflows are standardized, with Houdini that isn’t always the case since the logic can differ from person to person. It is that enormous flexibility that most people consider “difficult” about Houdini, which coincidentally is also what makes it so powerful.

As a Houdini artist and educator, I can't agree more with all the points Chris mentioned here. One of the first ways to get into Houdini is simply trying to shade, light and render assets from megascans or polyhaven. It's never easy doing water or fire simulation regardless of 3d package.

I REALLY need to jump into Houdini since it links with Unreal so well 🤙🏿

Yes! Yes! Yes! Houdini course plz 🙏

Extremely useful information, thankyou!

I very excited with this Sofware, Thanks!

Alright i was already curious but now i am going to finally start learning it. You did a great job of convincing.

I’m looking to break into 3D animation and have been self teaching myself with cinema 4D and from the videos I’ve been watching on Houdini it seems so much easier and after watching this video I’m hella excited to jump into Houdini apprentice and indie.

Thanks for the info Christopher

I have spent the last 2 years learning Houdini as a 3D student and found it extremely hard to learn at the beginning mainly because I went to watch and follow some cool simulation tutorials. It was a big mistakes that made me didn't understand the basics like how attributes work, attribute groups, geometry inspector graph etc...... It is def a software that takes ages to learn and pick up, the learning curve can be steeper than other software but once you the hang of it and don't give up easily. It is the MOST POWERFUL 3D software out there. Most major studios have changed or slowly changing their main pipeline workflow to Houdini from Maya and etc...... Highly recommend artists to learn Houdini at all levels. Thanks for the great video!

great video! thanks for demystifying this program:)

Love the Phrog plushie on the shelve

Don't kid yourself guys. This shit is the "Dark Souls" of 3D software. Very hard but also very rewarding.

Definitely excited.

Amazing video, thank you a lot 🎉

Yesssss more Houdini content please!!

I Started Learning Blender year ago and I got fascinated by 3d. And then I Discovered GeometryNodes short After i started learning blender. These nodes is amazing and I really like procedural workflows. About 2months ago I discovered that there are other program that Is 100% procedural and that was about Houdini. Started learning about 2 months ago. Many times I got frustrated (like in Blender year ago) but after every tutotial that I found on RU-vid Im getting more familiar with Houdini and kinda like it a lot. I hope that Houdini will become my friend like Blender and AfterEffects :D. Many things I still dont understand but this will come with time, and many things I already know cause I know how to build them in Blender with GeometryNodes - Logic behind some things are pretty the same, but using a different nodes

Wow. Exactly the reason why I havnt picked up Houdini. It’s funny because I’ve learnt c4d on a deep level and love creating stuff with xpresso etc…I turn anything I can into a rig..So I’ve always thought Houdini would be very well suited for me, it’s just these myths create a barrier! Does the Houdini apprentice allow you to export to c4? I’m pretty sure they stopped you from doing that, at least when I last checked? Thanks for this great video, I think I really needed to hear this!

Always wanted to learn Houdini after I heard someone at ILM talk about it - excited they have an apprentice version

so exited I just Start using and learn Houdini last week

I would love to see what course School of Motion releases with Houdini

I started learning Houdini and I have to say it is difficult to learn because I find it unforgiving. As a beginner, It is very difficult to troubleshoot. It is so much harder than blender to find solutions online. Even following great Entagma tutorials I sometimes get stuck. I'm going to learn it properly but I think you need to put some serious work into understanding Houdini so you can work out solutions yourself

I'm hooked!

Great explanation

I honestly believed all these myths lol, very interesing. I'll stick to blender for now, but it's good to update my knowledge, so thanks!

This program sounds so great I must learn it!

Change can be scary. I always intimidated with programing in houdini. Common artist look houdini as scientific research rather than artist tool. Would definetly trying soon. Thank you🙌🙌

100%! So when is SoM going to offer a Houdini course??

So true. Great video.

I think what we would like to see is a project fully setup than a breakdown of how easy it is and mor importantly how we can use it to intergrate it in with C4d. Example let’s just say you had a really simple scene of a fisherman sitting on a boat in the middle of the lake and the water is pretty still but a shark comes out of the water and bites the boat in half. How would we go about doing that either fully in Whodini or in Cinema 4D where the main set up is but then the important part like the boat, the shark in the area where the water interacts with the shark simulates. The reason I bring this up is because I think it be a lot easier to integrate Houdini in with other programs. We’re familiar with building in versus fully learning one program straight from scratch and doing everything there.

Thank you. its really amazing that how you explain what is vector could you please explain what is float, and other parameters too.

Hey Chris, you have talent to explain. Maybe one day there will be houdini course from you. And hope this will not be interface tuts but rother something cool like A. Kramer did😉

I don't know how you record your vocals, but the quality is impressive for not having it right in front of your face.

Looking forward with houdini!

Houdini is like learning to play the guitar. It's only 6 strings and a crap load of frets. When you start it's hard, but then over time things become easier. Then it becomes really hard to go back to any other 3d software. You will be happy you put in the time.

I hope school of motion will be making Houdini tutorials

Couldn't agree more with this!

Wanna see your take on Blender.

School of motion Please Bring some Osm courses on houdini not only for FX but for overall 3d work

Many thanks GOAT

Ok. So when is the Houdini Course opening at School of Motion?

What about the computer specs requirements? that's a very demanding software I believe because of all the simulations...

It's like cameras. It's much easier to get an "OK" shot with an iPhone than it is with a cinema camera, but almost impossible to get an exact, specific look that you fully control. For that, the "more complicated" cinema camera is far easier.

What kind of PC would I need to have for a beginner?

But with so much rapid change in technology like AI and so many softwares coming up with realtime simulations... is it worth putting so much time and effort in learning houdini?

That stuff is really good to know. I actually was assuming all of these myths to be true lol

Thats it I'm learning Houdini.

Houdini is amazing! Ive been using it as my main 3D app for about a year, and it feels very freeing. It's worth mentioning that it's not great for sculpting, texture painting, and a few other tasks.

Chris rutledge!!

I think there is no definitive answer. It's all about how your mind works. In the 2D world, some people like Fusion (node based) better, and it find it easier and faster, while others prefer After Effects (layer and layer group based). I think it boils down to in what way you, as an individual, find visualizing find is the easiest way to conceptualize how to get to a wanted result through tools. Some approaches I think literally use different mental functions than others, to get to the same result, and which type of function is easiest for you is both a learned habit and just genetics. I for one love 3DS Max's Modifier Stack. Everything else seems clunky. But that's me (and others like me). It's not really "better" than something else.

100% agree

In my view it is the hardest to learn, but not really hard. Getting in Vex is a little challenging. But I found Zbrush is a little more UI challenging.

more info on houdini !

The major problem oh Houdini is that it is so CPU dependant. Why we spend so much money for latest and greatest GPUs if its computing power not utilized properly? I'm waiting for the good times when the simulation calculations are made within seconds because otherwise it looks like a big scam kept by software developers and hardware manufacturers.

so I was searhching for a Houdini course at School Of Motion website,... found nothing

I agree with everything.

I dove in recently into Houdini specifically for simulations , and I have to admit it’s easier to learn than blender , and it seems logical and well thought through unlike maya

i always love getting perpetual licenses ... i use it for hobbyist projects ... so im always like ... whats the point in learning a software i wont be able to afford ... 6k is alot!

Just like Blueprint in Unreal Engine, but those who have created any game in UE knows to work with Blueprint you know solid knowledge of coding as well, same goes for Houidni, If anyone wants to do mindblowing work, he/she/him/her/they/them has to go through some amazing skills of coding and 3d together

Agree. Agree. Agree and... Agree... :)

I had to learn Houdini at university, I hated it and went back to Maya then moved to blender. Procedural 3d software is powerful but it's not how most artists work, imagine painting the Mona Lisa with a procedural technique...

I don't rule out that houdini is hard to master because VEX programming is multiplied by proceduralism, while 3ds max is just direct modeling

I don't like vex. But seeing how crazy VOPs can get. I rather use vex 😂😅

i only agree on point 5, the others are not good at all, and some of them are funny the guy start with a claim and contradict himself at end(like the point on programming/math, you don't need to know programming but you still need it), it's sad people like a lie, than a uncomfortable truth, the best way to describe houdini is this: """ Houdini is nearly a flawless software, with a procedural paradigm that considered as the FUTURE for 3D and VFX now but the software had it in mind and bake in itself 20 years ago, it has a high barrier of entry, but when you look at it from the other side, you know your learning is as simple as it can get, considering the power you're accessing, VEX is as fast as the C Language you could even write C functions and access them on VEX + has parallelism at it's core, very fast has most of it's effects multi-threaded, and some even run on the GPU with OpenCL, Houdini is always first to integrate scientific paper related to VFX and the math applied to 3D, VDB are the perfect example of that, the company that make it are so ahead that you don't ask for features you just wait to see what's new, you sit back and you're mesmerized but what they done, Houdini 20 promise a lot of things the company said that they will rewrite a lot of the old logic on new bases, can't wait to see that, there is a presentation now on the new feather system coming to H20, the thinking is so far ahead """ In my opinion what made Houdini a dilemma, is the poor learning resources, now it's fine but 10 years ago a software was a blackbox, the software need hefty guides on it's inner workings, still to this day there is a lot of resources missing, let's take an example, if you go inside the popfluid node, you could find that just with the software flawless logic they implemented a fluid behaving particles, inside you could find the lego pieces that made it possible, the Enable Solver node, the Geometry SOP, OpenCL VEX, all put in some hard to crack logic that made it possible, i just can understand the general idea of it, but very far from reproducing something like that myself, only some Russian folks have some tutorials that skim those nodes in Houdini, some could argue it's too complex, i will say in fact that how houdini works if you want the real experience of it and be fluent, you need to know that there is exhaustive resources of the inner workings of it, that you could rely on any time, it's makes you confident implementing simple examples, they made the Houdini Sessions to solve party this problem, but it's far from what's it should be done, KineFX also is a great example very few people in the world, use it to it's full potential, i think it's a culture inside that company, they consider themselves as a niche, i hope they will share more knowledge in the future, also minor things Houdini should think of people that do classic modeling with easy to learn shortcut, they started to do stuff toward that goal(with the python UI curves tools), and finally the plugins, it's still the stone age, with the houdini.env i think it's time the software integrate simple installers that get's rid of all those annoyances.

afraid? yes, but thank you!

When I first started in with Houdini, as it unfolded before me, I watched this mountain grow and grow and had that I'm sure quite common feeling of JEEZ.,. what have I gotten myself into? Then there was an afternoon when it clicked, and I say to you that the clouds opened, rays of sunshine fell on my face, and a chorus of angels sang hallelujah! And thus I was enlightened. You're wrong... Houdini isn't a program... it's a language! See, in a program, you can do what the programmer is allowing you to do, what he's programmed in. And that's why everything else is so frustrating for me to work with, like I'm wearing a straight-jacket. But Houdini... Many solutions to any problem, and no limits!

The one thing that Houdini lacks is great tutorial series for beginners. It's not an accident that blender donut is famous.

nah fam

It's absolutely the hardest to learn, I don't know what you're taking about.

Myth Number 3: you need to coding or math to use it. noo My friend you need coding and Math to make the software do what you want.

fear of getinto it? crash is more fear for some low pc . who wanna use powerful software.

I tried it many times, but bumped right into such steep learning curves that it completely ruined the fun I want to have while working with my creativity. That's the whole point for me. I want to see results, maybe not instantly (however, I would love to) but at least make some sence on drafts I created. I mean, I already have the picture in my head. I definitely don't want to overthink the entire scene. So all in all I think if you work in a team and there's one guy who speaks Houdini it would be helpful for finetuning and enhancing the whole scene, to make it all connected. But for me, it's a hard pass. (I want to give it one more try in the near future, but I don't count on it that I will be converted 😂

Thanks for the video, but this has not helped in making me even want to think of attempting Houdini again. If you're a character artist or want to be a character artist, then forget about Houdini.

Yeah, not. Not convincing, not because you say it is not difficult and that you couldn't disagree more means that it's true. The power of words is a thing of beauty 😂

I move keyframes in a 30 year old software. I don't belong to this comment section 🤣

Houdini is the easiest software to uninstall in a few seconds.

I hate Houdini's UI, they should hire a bona fide UI designer. UI is a big deal to me for some reason, can't help it.

this video was generated by A.I?

Houdini way is the only way, once you go procedural you never go back. RU-vid kids can play with their blender, real men use Houdini only

he sounds like an ai