Today, I finally started diving into Houdini. I’ve known for a while that this was a necessary step to elevate my VFX skills, but I kept putting it off. Now that I’m in, here are some of my initial thoughts.
Houdini is all about procedural generation, which makes sense when you consider why it’s so good at creating effects like smoke and fire. It leans heavily on math-related nodes and really pushes you to think creatively. Imagine Shader Graph on steroids. (Though shader work is an art form in its own right.) I’m glad I’ve got a solid foundation in shaders because, even though it’s a different beast, the idea of visually scripting and passing values within a graph to create an end result is something both share. If you’re used to working in Blender with modifiers and geometry nodes, Houdini will likely feel more intuitive.
I didn’t get too far today, thanks to some other personal commitments, but grasping the basic concept alone made today worthwhile. I’m using Udemy’s Complete Houdini FX Bootcamp, and I’m genuinely excited to see where this journey leads.
There are still some gaps in the early lessons, but I know those will fill in with time—just like everything else. For now, it’s all about diving in and going for it.
The plan is to finish this entire course by the end of next week. After that, I’ll probably start working on this Liar-Chess Game idea I’ve been mulling over.