Houdini - ShotGrid - Other pipeline tools

Houdini in our ShotGrid pipeline has two other nice features that you should be aware of.

Task templates

It's possible to create a Houdini file that will be loaded by default when an artist creates a new file in a given pipeline step. E.g. a clothing FX template gets automatically loaded in when you create your first file on a clothing FX task. Setting this up is easy, browse to your ShotGrid project on the Storage server and go to 00_pipeline -> houdini -> templates. Here you can add .hipnc files, they should have the same name as the pipeline step for which they should be automatically loaded, like this:

Pipeline step names can be found on the ShotGrid site. Be sure to replace a space with an underscore in the .hipnc file.

Project-specific HDAs

It's nice to have some custom HDAs that are automatically loaded for the project you're working on. To add an HDA to a project, browse to your ShotGrid project on the Storage server and go to 00_pipeline -> houdini -> otls. Here you can add your .hda files, like this:

OTL (Operator Type Library) is Houdini's technical term for its internal representation of a digital asset.