Stauffer started with a quick recap on Side Effects, noting they were now in their 26th year with Houdini being their main flagship product. If you haven’t come across Unity before, it is a game development system offering a powerful rendering engine integrated with a complete set of tools and workflows for create interactive 3D and 2D games content. We have an interview about this news a bit later in the article, but first a bit about the Side Effects presentation.Īlthough the presentation mainly focused on Unity, Stauffer was quick to point out the system worked the same if you were in Maya, Softimage or C4D. Also, the ability for TDs to create approachable Houdini tools for use within Cinema 4D should be a big bonus. MAXON’s Cinema 4D and Houdini make a great pair, as each has complementary strengths. This was introduced last year, but at FMX Side Effects announced Houdini Engine for Cinema 4D and also that the Maya plugin would be available as an open source project. In this session Rob Stauffer walked us through Houdini Engine, a system for loading Houdini Digital Assets into 3rd party 3D applications such as Unity, Maya or Softimage. In case you missed it, be sure to check out our other coverage from FMX 2014:įMX 2014: day one report FMX 2014: day two report FMX 2014: day three/four report Side Effects Software Houdini Engine & Cinema 4D A special thanks to Matt Leonard, who helped cover all the happenings in Stuttgart this year. Find full pricing here.In our final report from FMX2014, we cover the announcement that Cinema 4D will be supporting the Houdini Engine as well as have a sneak peek at the upcoming RealFlow 2014. Houdini itself costs between $1,995 and $6,995 for a perpetual licence, depending on which edition of the software you buy, and whether you need a node-locked or floating licence. Use of Houdini Engine with other software requires a paid licence, which costs $499/year for a node-locked licence, or $795/year for a floating licence. Studios can then get up to 10 free global floating licences online via the SideFX store further licences are available on request. And then you need your licenses loaded into the license manager to make them available”.įree licences of Houdini Engine for UE4 and Houdini Engine for Unity can be accessed by installing Houdini 18.5.499+, which runs on Windows 8+, macOS 10.13+ and many Linux distros. Studios will also need a commercial licence of Houdini itself.Īccording to SideFX’s FAQs, this “will be called upon ‘under-the-hood’ when the plug-in is processing assets. To use the plugins for 3ds Max, Maya or proprietary software, or to batch process Houdini renders or simulations on a render farm – another function of Houdini Engine – studios still need commercial licences. Today’s announcement makes it possible for larger studios to use the Houdini Engine plugins for Unity and Unreal Engine for free on their commercial projects. Unity and UE4 plugins can now be used free by large studios, not just indie artists SideFX develops connection plugins for 3ds Max, Maya, Unity and Unreal Engine – the one for Cinema 4D is no longer listed on its website – and studios can create custom plugins via the Houdini Engine API. Houdini Engine enables artists to import procedural assets created in Houdini into other DCC applications, and edit them inside the host app.

hda assets inside other DCC applications and game engines The functionality was already free for artists or indie studios with revenues under $100,000/year via a Houdini Engine Indie licence. The plugins enable users to import edit procedural assets created in Houdini into Unreal Engine or Unity and edit them natively inside the game engine during game development or virtual production work. SideFX has made Houdini Engine for UE4 and Houdini Engine for Unity free to all users. Posted by Jim Thacker Houdini Engine for UE4 and Unity now free to all users

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