How long to learn Houdini?

jordank95 · Jul 11 2025

I am so overwhelmed with where to start learning Houdini. I want to start learning this to incorporate into my skillset and add another tool that I can use in the studio I work for. Roughly how long until I can start using this in a professional setting? Can anyone recommend a good starting point to help ease my mind? Thank you.

jStins · Jul 11 2025

I've flirted with Houdini a few times and made good progress with the learning paths here: https://www.sidefx.com/learn/

My flirtations have never evolved into a full blown romance, but I still see Houdini making eyes at me from across the room every now and then. As far as how long it takes to get good enough to use it in a professional capacity? well...

Farmfield on X torstenebker s8n Haha this is still my

Farmfield on X torstenebker s8n Haha this is still my

poopipe · Jul 12 2025

that's not far from the truth.

I often wonder if its harder coming into Houdini with a technical background than it is without - personally I find it quite restrictive and weird as hell but that's probably because I could write the code(poorly) to do the thing myself and I don't like having to bend my design to the peculiarities of the system

anyway

a word(s) of advice.
learn a tool because you have a job to do and you think that tool will help you achieve it - not because you heard its a good idea to know it.

jordank95 · Jul 13 2025

poopipe said:

a word(s) of advice.
learn a tool because you have a job to do and you think that tool will help you achieve it - not because you heard its a good idea to know it.

Solid advice. Though I would be learning it knowing that it would be helpful in the pipeline for an upcoming game I will be working on. Could we get around not using it? Of course...but I've always wanted to learn it and I think it would be beneficial in the coming year for me to know it.

poopipe · Jul 13 2025

what sort of thing are we talking about?

Benjammin · Jul 13 2025

I've been learning in on and off for a couple years and feel relatively competent - I'm able to solve problems and do some VEX, but I'm still talking to chatGPT a lot (which is its own learning curve...).
If you have specific problems to solve in your pipeline then you can spend a bit of time getting used to the fundamentals then zero in on the specific things you need to solve.

corymeyer · Jul 20 2025

I'm 18 months into Houdini.

Houdini needs to be learned in a specific order.

First you start with SOPs, learn about attributes, and start learning VEX. VEX is optional because of VOPs, but highly recommended, and VEX is usually simpler than VOPs. Then you learn POPs, then Vellum, then RBD, then Pyro, then FLIP, then Oceans. It's a logical progression which builds upon knowledge.

gnoop · Jul 21 2025

I personally spent some time studying Houdini decade or more ago but found a company would be reluctant to build their toolset on Houdini base. Same story in a way with Substance Designer actually which nobody uses really but me. Then I found all I ever wanted to do in Houdiny like complex arrays and scatter systems are easier to do with Blender nodes which are pretty simple really or 3dmax plugins like Railclone. And some 3d party particle simulation and speed tree midleware are much more likely to be used in a game project than Houdini.

Tried a few recent releases and found things like adaptive uv generation for procedural geometry like clever usage of trim sheets or content blocks in game style is still a gray area there not that much better than with Blender nodes or perhaps I just missed a lot. It still feels sort of way outside of typical gamedev needs. Chat GPT also not that great in writing scripts for Houdini vs Blender where it really shines and does wonders .

So I have a bit different question than OP did: is it worth it really? I mean in today AI future expectations? Should i rather learn Unreal blue print?

How long to learn Houdini?

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