by Andrew
Iris Generation R&D So this is a bit of R&D i did over a weekend to help with making Eyes. Obviously the iris is a very complicated element of eyes. But i tackled making it with Hair. I still think it is a little bit away from being a full production tool. This will be part of a larger tool. A few years ago i made a full eye Asset entitled “abSimpleEye” which turned out to be not that simple […]
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by Andrew
Eyelash R&D Always looking to cut down on time spent on things that take up little space on-screen. Eyelashes have always been a bit of a pain to create. They usually need to be bespoke and and controlled, and usually you cannot transfer them from one character to another. So here is my take on it, its all procedural and has a bunch of controls from clumping to goopy mascara and/or settled snow.
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by Andrew
Quick Tip #3: Guide Width In this week’s quick tip i show you how to adjust the width of your guides and how to control it with a ramp. I forgot to mention the only downside can see with this method is you lose the ability for pre-selection highlighting. Also i as stated in the video if you are unfamiliar with creating your own Pie menus or radial menus, check out this video by Werner Ziemerink which covers the process. […]
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by Andrew
Quick Tips #2: Controlling Clumps This is probably the most in-depth Quick tip i will produce in this series. So would you like to be able to control the shape of your clumps better through out your grooms?Well in this video i provide two methods of doing so. 1. Is via Clump blending (good for combining basic levels of clumps, good for animal/creature grooms) 2 Is via a profile combination system (great for granular level of control) I hope you […]
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by Andrew
Quick Tips #1: Length Attribute I’ve wanted to do a bunch of quick tips about Groom and Houdini for a while now and so… here it is. This first one is a little simple thing that almost everywhere I’ve worked has wanted from Groom… and that is a length attribute. By default Houdini does not provide this for you. But in this short little video I show you how to create it. I’ve also provided the scene so here it […]
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by Andrew
Digi-Double Template I’ve been using Houdini for years but its only this last year I’ve been using it in Production for groom. Just like any other part of Houdini it has infinite options but working in an unorganised way can cause many problems. Not only just you trying to understand what it is you have done but others. So I have been developing this network to easily manage all aspects of a groom, troubleshoot. Along with export options, formats and […]
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by Andrew
Dynamic Parting R&D When I worked at MPC and Framestore there was a phenomenon that both studios added to their groom / cfx pipelines as seen in films like Lion King, Lady & the Tramp and on shows like His Dark Materials. Everyone has a different name for it but lets call it Dynamic Parting. This is the phenomenon of parting the hair in a unique way only when the geometry is deforming. It adds a very believable level of […]
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by Andrew
Braid / Rope R&D Here is a quick snapshot of my braid/rope workflow. I think iv’e got all the kinks worked out i just need to optimise it a bit further. It’s pretty robust, I have used this to make braids and rope on an upcoming film (delayed because of Covid). It works by creating the shape of the braid with curves then making geometry from them. Then with a width attribute via a ramp I can control the width […]
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Andrew Browne