DavidKahlVFX

Project Files | Chapter 1

Not that much has happened in chapter 1, but still.

After each clip I am going to share that status of the project with the Auditorium tier. 

Giving you the option to digg into files and have a starting point in case you want to skip sections.

Cheers

Dave

Terrain and Curve Preparation | Chapter 1 - Clip 1

Early Access to the first chapter. 

My plan is to put the introduction and this first chapter for an open release tomorrow.

The first clip of Chapter 2 will be available to you guys - hopefully on the same day. 

I am aiming to give you guys a week lead on the clips as they go.

The project files will be an exclusive for the Auditorium tier. 

I would love to do more writing but I just wanted to finish some work and get this out to you guys. Time for ...

Introduction to the new Railsystem

I have no time left to add descriptions and such but I wanted you guys to already get a look on the new introduction.

The first two chapters are ready to be uploaded and you guys will see them first.

The project files will be available for the auditorium while I am here to answer anyones questions that might come up during the  course.

I had fun with the honest trailers guys voice and I hope you like how it turned out.

The main part of the course is voiced with a ...

Vex Quicktip - Function Overload

Hey guys 

I am experimenting with generated AI voice to create more content.

What do you guys think about these Audiograms?

Cheers

Dave

DK Redshift Material Generator v1.0

Hey folks,

it was about time that I got back to work and create. While I can almost start to release the first chapter of the rail I managed to get deeper into python.

At the end of creating the geometry of the train I export alembic files for texturing in substance. The textures are saved into a folder that may contain more then one mesh.

With the export setting in Substance Painter it created 5 textures for each meshgroup. The train cabin alone has 6 groups. That means you...

Railsystem Update and Summary

Hey everyone,

after quite some time of adjusting to the additions to the family I kept on working to record the creation process of the rail system. 

At this moment I am working through chapter 7. Ones that is done I am going to start the creation of the actual clips. This will basicly "only" involve a more precise editing and the voice over. But the footage is already there and roughly cut. 

There will be a chapter 8 and 9 but I will do that a bit later. It will i...

How to Import JSON Data into Houdini

 JSON is a very commonly used data format so you will come across it at  some point. 

In this video I show you how to get that data into houdini  and manipulate your project geometry with it.  In addition to this video there is an advanced version of this where I  take a look at a more complex json file to extract its data and do funny  stuff with it.  

This is the basic video shared on youtube with its files going public after 4 days.

How to Import JSON Data into Houdini

JSON is a very commonly used data format so you will come across it at some point. In this video I show you how to get that data into houdini play around with ideas to visualize that data.

As an example I use the JSON file for my alexa skill "houdini database"

This is the first ever exclusive patreon video that I did and I hope you like it. Let me know what you think and if you would like to see more.

Here is the link to the mentioned youtube basic video

&nb...

An update on the rail

Hello folks,

for everyone not strolling on the discord server let me give you an update on where things stand. I have converted the system to Houdini 18 and added alot of new ideas and features. It is basicly a completely different thing then what I started with.

Here is a list of features that was added 

- different altitude based on parameters and terrain

- leaning orientation according to curvature

- Gates with procedural animation once the train approach...

Going on a Rampage! (public)

This one was came very sudden since Rohan asked for a tool to be even lazier than before.

 He wanted a tool to banish the last line of vex that he can't get rid of. :)

@Cd.x = chramp

Feeding a ramp into the color channel for further processing. That sparked the idea for this small utility asset and its perfect name. 

The idea is to be able to feed any attribute into any attribute while using a curve to manipulate the result.

This is the fir...

Going on a RAMPAGE!

This one was came very sudden since Rohan asked for a tool to be even lazier than before.

 He wanted a tool to banish the last line of vex that he can't get rid of. :)

@Cd.x = chramp

Feeding a ramp into the color channel for further processing. That sparked the idea for this small utility asset and its perfect name. 

The idea is to be able to feed any attribute into any attribute while using a curve to manipulate the result.

This is the first prototype ...

The Discord Server is up

As it seems everyone who already uses discord got auto invited. So if you want to join you simply have to connect your patreon account to discord and you get access right away. 

The general access is for every active patreon no matter the tier. There are a few extra channels for tier related content though.

I will have to do some digging on the ruleset and roles but it should be working in general.

So hop on if you want and we take it from there. 

...

Machine learning

I finally found an angle to approach this!

That is all I wanted to say! I wasn't that excited on content I discovered since I worked through the lake side series.

I already know that I have to create some sort of content with it.

But how do you guys feel about that?
Is machine learning an important part for 3d content?

Cheers
Dave

Discord for Houdini Coders?

Hey folks,

Just a quick question. Since discord seems to be the current tool for communication - would you enjoy a dedicated discord server for this patreon page? It feels odd to call it a David Kahl VFX Discord so it could be something like "Coders Den" where people can ask questions about that aspect of Houdini or anything else where we can help.

I have the feeling that many dont like to use patreon itself for this kind of thing. Thoughts?

Dave

Happy new Year!

Hello folks, 

I hope everyone is well and reached the new year in one piece. 

2020 is going to be another busy year. So let me give you a quick update on things. 

My new workstation is up and running. Powered by a Ryzen 9 3950x and a RTX 2070 Super. The machine packs a punch and it handles big projects with ease.

Some issues with the case and its own fan hub but it seems to work fine.

With that new system I started to convert the rail to...

Flatten and Wrap | Example file - PrimUV( )

A new file based around the function primuv. 

I think I first saw this on a blog written by Toadstorm. He used it to wrap a particle sim around a can.

And since we are now in H18 I throw in the 2 wonderfull new versions of bend and sweep to create this example. 

First we need to create clean UVs on the tube. To do that I start with a grid where I can simply project UVs. Then I bend it to a tube. 

2019-12-04 15:48:02 +0000 UTC View Post

Randomized Transition | Example File - Lerp/Fit

A new file to share.  The idea  for this was to create random transitions foreach point, be it Position, Color or any other attribute.

The trick here is that each point gets assigned it's individual Frame when to start the transition and how long it will take.

It also applies a noise and offset vector to illustrate how you can change the transition attribute which goes from 0 to 1 into other gradients like 1-0-1 or 0-1-0. Here it is used to apply the offset only during t...

Particle Forcefield | Example File - Cross

Hey folks,

this is the first of hopefully many entries. For one I wanted to share some ideas with people. Just simple ideas like this vex based forcefield effect. 

A buddy of mine was wondering how you would approach it in vex, knowingly ignoring stuff like the obstacle steering node. 

This approach uses the cross product which makes it a good example for the cross function.    

 I am going to go with Farmfields example and share these fil...

The rail is evolving

 Hey folks,

since this project dragged itself so long, started to grow a beard and needed a walking stick, I decided to make the best of it. 

H18 is around the corner with some additions to some mechanisms like Loops. Since it would be upsetting to realeas this course with partly older versions I am retouching the whole project to give you something new.

Previously I planned to have the rail on one level without any changes in the orientation. And then I saw sc...

DK Tool v1.1 - Superwrangle and Mandelbrot

The file and demo for version 1.1

With this version I added the Mandelbrot Set tool. It also allows the use of the Julia Set and displacement according to that value. First experiments to create a terrain with this where successful ;-)

 I added a new category "General" and I am going to push a few options around to make it a bit more organized.

In that category I added a "superwrangle". It basicly allows you to switch in the same UI between a normal wrangle and a wrangl...

The Houdini Database is live

Yay 😅

After the third certification round I fixed all bugs and included the requested best practices.

Going to do a video after a short vaccation.

Cheers
Davis

The strategy for the Railsystem and future projects

Hey folks,

this post is directly adressed to my patrons of the Auditorium tier - those that are able to watch the current videos of the railsystem and due to the tier already did so much to support me in what I try to do and build. 

You are probably aware that it is very difficult and time consuming for me to create video content.  I am quick to iterate in developement and my head is always filled with ideas for new concepts and projects. But that does not help the fact ...

DK Tool v1.1 | Mandelbrot

I made a first run on what I had in mind with the mandelbrot set. 

This tool expects a grid on the first input and will create the typical mandelbrot figure. It uses the provided points so its resolution is directly related to the amount of divisions on the grid.

Also included is the option to use the resulting value as displacement, change the result to the julia set and a way to co...

DK Tool Asset Demo

I finally managed to fight through my switch from Adobe to Resolve and finished the demo video for the tool asset.

This is also the first experiment for recording with the native resolution of my ultrawide. What do you guys say? 

This will put bars at the top and bottom when you go into fullscreen. 

The benefit of this is that you can select up to 2k in the resolution AND youtube uses a higher bitrate when doing their compression. 

Houdini Database | Alexa Devblog #1

I was wondering how the alexa developement could be integrated into the patreon. Obviously if people find the skill interesting, helpful and/or fun it might attract a few more people that are interested in related information.

So here is a first devblog about the process of bringing this alexa skill to live.

And if you are not into the idea you might still be interested in the process behind the developement in the Amazon environment.

Alot of it will come in handy once I div...

Preview for Tool Asset v 1.1

It just so happened that I was interested in some areas, did the research and created the prototypes for it. 

All of these will be added to the tool asset as new features.

Since I am building a more sophisticated version to work together with crowds I still want to add the basic approach of the A* pathfinding into the tool. I shared some images recently.

The next thing I explored was the cardioid - it just happended to pop up when I did some more work with polar coordin...

A function library

I wanted to do this right from the start but using an asset with a UI felt more usable to share with others.

But I am still going to build this function library for myself and I am also going to add these to my alexa app. 

The resulting dk_lib.h file will eventually be available the usual way as if it would be an asset. 

I want to have stuff I use very often available with as a quick function call.  

Something Crowd related maybe...

I recently got triggered to recreate the A* pathfinding algorithm. To be fair - you can use the findshortestpath node but I love to digg into these algorithm and challenge myself to find a solution.

But there is a bigger idea behind this. I wanted to do something similar for a while now. It is one puzzle piece to create crowd effects I was facinated with.

For example this scene from the upcoming game cyberpunk 2077

2019-09-18 14:32:05 +0000 UTC View Post

Tunnel Carving | Railsystem Part 8

In this clip we isolate the tunnel segments to carve out the terrain.

DK Tool File, Tool Demo File and Doku

Edit (12.09.) Reuploaded the demo file with cameras foreach example

Edit(13.09.) Rebuild the Asset as an hdalc file, almost completed the inbuilt Help and updated The Doku File and the demo file