Octane Plugin UX/Workflow Tweet

[caseyhupke]

I finally started using the octane plugin in Houdini again, haven't touched it since the first version years ago. I've used Octane a ton in c4d where it feels like it was built into the app. I have a few questions about where the plugin may be headed.

What's with the target shop? This feels completely strange and almost like its texturing the camera to make Octane run.

Is there any way to get device information on the IPR like in c4d? GPU temps, etc. I can't seem to figure out how to enable that feature if it's there.

Any chance we could see the whole IPR get HiDPI support? it's nearly impossible to read on a 4k screen.

Will we be getting access to basecolor_texture control in materials? I haven't seen this brought up in a while, but its something I use a lot.

Overall things feel very scattered compared to the cinema 4d plugin, and it'd be great to know if there are UX plans on the horizon.

The redshift integration in Houdini feels like its a native plugin, octane in c4d feel like it's a native plugin.

[juanjgon]

Hi,

The render target SHOP is an HDA that holds inside a custom configuration of all the Octane render target related nodes and features. It exposes in a user-friendly form all the information related to the cameras, kernels, environments, etc. Of course, you could build your own render target nodes or HDAs. Internally all works like in the Standalone, using nodes.

The OpenGL IPR has a stats panel, but the CPU temp. for example, is not available on it.

In the plugin options panel, IPR tab, you have an option to scale the IPR window and widgets for HiDPI displays.

Sorry, what is the "basecolor_texture control" in the materials? I can't see this parameter in the Octane material nodes, but perhaps it is something added on the C4D plugin side.

Why do you think that all the things are scattered in the Houdini plugin? It has been designed like all the other Houdini renderer plugins available. A ROP node including the file and rendering options, a tab of OBJ spare parameters including all the object level options, a whole set of VOP nodes including all the Octane shader and render target related nodes, a SHOP and vopnet Octane material builder, a shelf with Octane tools, some HDAs to support the Octane lights, etc. Perhaps the weirdest non-standard feature is the OpenGL IPR, but a whole new Qt5 dockable IPR window is planned in the short term to close this gap with other renderers.

Thanks,
-Juanjo

[caseyhupke]

viewtopic.php?f=25&t=69661

here is a forum post about basecolor_texture, it's the only one I could find, which is weird.

Let's say you were reading a series of images from disk as the 'diffuse' parameter of your material. You could quickly pipe-in an override + attribute to cycles through them based on specific conditions. Letting 1 material have procedural randomization, without having to make 1 material per image.

Primarily supported by all the large CPU render engines and mantra.

Maybe with point attributes and a qt5 IPR it will feel more built-in?

I'm really excited for 2020, and just chiming in because the redshift integration is so clean. The 2 are so similar in 'concept' it makes me hope they can feel similar while jumping between them.

I supposed Solaris delegates will help with that though?

Thanks again for your work on both plugins.