Yes, but in a way, the ground work seems to be already done or at the very least planned for.
The best example would be Modifiers, rather then having a bevel modifier ‘hard coded’, it could be in the future a GeoNode with various parameters listed back.
In some ways it sounds a bit like how Houdini actually does stuff right now. The ‘top level tools’ are in fact all nodes underneath.
I was of course around at the time, but was more bust working on other stuff and focusing on using other area’s of Blender. I also felt that it was very much a total work in progress back then and that anything and everything could change, making trying to learn and use it half pointless as nothing could be the same come next release.
As such, I pretty much just ignored the whole lot.
Blender’s Geometry Nodes are easier than Houdini…and there are many new tools based on Geometry Nodes that are brain-dead easy to configure and deploy.
When Houdini was released, it was $16,000 (adjusted for inflation).
So, remember that it gained industry attention and adoption even with that pricetag, when people wish to bemoan that Blender isn’t as popular as Houdini with major studios.
This part you’re wrong about. I know quite a few individuals who uses Houdini for their freelancing. I’ve been using it in production myself for the last 6 months and I can say that Houdini is great for individuals.
I’ve barely scratched the surface of the software but once you get going with it Houdini saves you a lot of time because how you can use proceduralism and automation. It’s very smart software.
Although, I must admit, initially its a lot of pain to get used to Houdini. But once you push through you’ll get rewarded for your perseverance.
Also, the indie license is very affordable.
Blender + Houdini is a killer combination for me. Funnily enough, since Blender went geometry nodes route I see a lot of similarities between the two.
Houdini is really great for individual artists. Also SideFX is probably the last 3D tech company who is very artists focused and keeps delivering great value for the money.
I have seen students start crying when shown shader nodes. Houdini isn’t catching indie artists.
Most artists don’t have complex enough needs to have motivation for sitting through such learning curve, and putting in hours. Number of people who NEED Houdini is small, and nobody is gonna learn it for the fun of it.
The exact same wording can be used for geometry nodes, and in fact I think it is one of the most successful endeavors for Blender, with plenty of amazing artworks and experiments being posted daily online. Same with Houdini, I see plenty of experiments being posted online, many by freelancers and not studios.
On the opposite, I think nodes are particularly good at making accessible advanced setups, abstracting a lot of the complexity. If you get used to it, you can really do advanced things in Houdini without ever recurring to scripting. Their node library is enough.
Not saying nodes are easy. Just that 3d artists are already dealing with relatively complex software in any case, compared to other artistic means. Not meaning to say everyone should use nodes. Just that the situation is not so tragic and there are plenty of indie artists using Houdini in the most disparate fields, from gaming to fashion to, of course, VFX.
I was just frustrated that I couldn’t do certain things and started learning Houdini. The more I learned the more I liked it and found out how Houdini can save you time.
I have plenty of complains about Houdini but overall my experience is quite positive.
Everytime point is made for this, I hear same things.
People aren’t willing to go through it, trust me, because:
Very few indie artists need to do very advanced stuff. Most of them want quick sketches, quick realization of their ideas, just png for Instagram.
Houdini, and anything node-based isn’t suitable for that.
Now Geometry Nodes has advantage that you can never touch a node but rip the rewards of the system with modifier stacks. In Houdini, even adding a cube is node. And even using nodes on that simple level requires you to understand what noodles are, how data flows from node to node.
Take a look at Blender addons, how many of them have selling point “you never have to touch nodes”. Its a plague. People just want do sketch art. They don’t want to have to add “Sculpt” node beforehand.
Perhaps you are always making the same point, then
What you write is based on a very wide generalization that, I think, also lies on a very pessimistic view of what an indie artist is. I say, though: look online! You’ll find plenty of tinkerers and experimenters. Some of the best artists, probably. Blender, Houdini, Substance, Unreal, and more: social media are full of artists doing great things using these tools.
You say: there are addons for one-click solutions that sell like candies. Certainly, Blender Market is full of them. In the meantime, Unreal has probably become the most important 3d software on the planet, and it’s nodes. Houdini has become the go to procedural suite for every field. Substance Designer has a pretty extensive community around it, and it is one of the most common tools in the field.
There’ll be artists who will look for the one-click solution. There’ll be those who are not happy with what they get and they’ll look for alternative ways, and then they’ll meet nodes. There are those who are using some of the most common 3d applications of the time, and then, well, they’ll probably eventually meet nodes too.
And just to close, I don’t think nodes are going to swallow the world. They coexist with other approaches, which have their fundamental place too. Just… they’re definitely everywhere
I think there are three main reasons for learning Houdini over other packages:
You need to do very accurate physical sims, particularly water, gases, and destruction.
You need to rely on a very procedural pipeline for iterate either many options for your client, or you work in games and need procedurally generated assets.
You’re looking for employment in a large VFX house/studio and you know that knowing Houdini will give you a leg up.
Otherwise, for most other CG artists out there, there are more compelling packages.
I think it could be argued that 1 and 3 could apply to 3dsMax with plugins like Tyflow/Thinking Particles/Rayfire/etc, while also allowing artists to work in a more ‘familiar’ 3D package. Allan McKay probably being the best example that I know.
I thought the same, especially when seeing how COPs work for compositing too, and how animation tools are growing.
Now, I wish Blender’s Layered Textures, if they’ll happen in my lifetime, will be built similarly. I liked a lot how attributes can be pass from SOPS to COPS and back to SOPS as much as one wants. Really powerful workflows ahead. Also, good choice on using SDFs for shape construction.
I also like how it can work on UVs. It can work like a procedural Substance Painter.
We finally got our sculpt team to overhaul Dyntopo and Multires, and the BF appears to have finally discovered the utility of layers in animation, so a kind of layer system in painting with its data able to be accessed with nodes is no longer out of the question, I think.
There has been evidence in the past few years that the Blender bubble has started to dissipate, starting with 2.8 having left-click select and colored wireframes (you can now actually talk about Blender on other sites without the risk of being caught in a long UI/UX debate).
Importing SOP into COP to make texture is a game changing workflow. There are certain tasks that are more easily done in 3d than purely with texture (e.g precise scattering, curves, simulation…).
