There are two workflows that I think would work well for me. Which one should I choose?
1. The Blender Path
In this path, I would create models in Blender, take them into Substance to texture them, and then take them into Houdini to rig and animate them. After that, I'd export them back into Blender to be rendered with either Cycles or Luxrender, and then composited. The advantage of Cycles is that Pro Lighting Studio supports it; however, I have heard that Luxrender is faster and more powerful.
2. The Houdini Path
In this path, I would make my models in Blender, texture them in Substance, and rig and animate them in Houdini. Then I would render them with either Mantra or Redshift (Redshift appeals to me because it is both biased and GPU accelerated). After that, I would composite it in either Fusion or Nuke (I won't use Smoke or Flame because they are Autodesk products and I have determined that Autodesk is immoral, and After Effects is out of the question because it doesn't have nodes).
In either workflow, I might consider using Terragen for terrain generation and/or HDR Light Studio for lighting. Houdini has terrain tools, though, so I will only use Terragen if it's really, really, good. The main problems with The Blender Path are that I don't know if I can keep attributes such as heat and density from Houdini pyro simulations so that I can properly shade them and that Blender doesn't have a Substance Plugin, so I can only animate the warping of textures if I render them in Houdini. The only problem that I can see with The Houdini Path is that it's hard to find good free tutorials for it. I would love to hear your thoughts on this.
Could somebody at least say "I don't know"? I don't want this thread to sink!
On a more serious note, I would love to help you but I'm not experienced enough to give you any advise on these programs. I only know a little bit of Blender, the rest I haven't used and some I don't even know... I do hope someone else here can help you organise the pros and cons and helps you on your way. But I'm sure you will find the right path to follow, you seem like the person who always finds his way 😎
There's no clear answer here, so I'll have to say I don't know either. It really depends on your personal goals. If you want to be able to make money as a freelancer I would stick to Blender as you won't run into any license issues, but if you want to work at a big studio in the future and explore other software, Houdini would be a great choice.
@jlampel I think a simpler way to say it would be: Which is best, Cycles, Luxrender, Mantra, or Redshift?
that is like asking which is best; apple or orange. highly subjective. Jonathan has great answer, which i'd add following, it depends on what is your end goal is and go from there, if you plan on working on studios, find out what they are using and learn that as a priority, however, that doesn't rule out any other software and whether you should learn those aswell comes down to time what you want to use it for.
every software has their pros and cons, and after that comes peoples preferences which are highly subjective. at best you could search the net and ask on those software forums what they think of it, and again, getting highly subjective answers that you then need to make own conclusions which is better.
what i've heard none of the renderers are bad in the sense of the word. its not easy to decide when you have options to choose from. though, in core every software is pretty similar, most of the time goes into learning how to use it.
I don't plan on ever becoming a freelancer or working at a studio. I want to do this mostly for fun, and maybe earn some money by selling courses and add-ons. However, it is a hobby I take very seriously, and I am prepared to spend a lot of time and money on it. I don't care about how easy a software is to learn as much as I care about the power and control it offers.
I don't plan on ever becoming a freelancer or working at a studio. I want to do this mostly for fun, and maybe earn some money by selling courses and add-ons. However, it is a hobby I take very seriously, and I am prepared to spend a lot of time and money on it. I don't care about how easy a software is to learn as much as I care about the power and control it offers.
When is it that you have more fun ? Then you have most of your answer. Don't strain yourself into something you'll hate.
I have officially decided that I will take The Houdini Path because of these two reasons:
1. I did some research, and it seems that Redshift is one of the fastest renderers (besides real time ones, of course). It takes mere seconds to remove all the noise from a render. Also, it not only uses the GPU's memory, but also the computer's RAM, meaning that "out of memory" errors are extremely rare. Also, Redshift has direct access to Houdini's attributes.
2. Houdini has a Substance Plugin. With it I will be able to make all sorts of crazy effects!
For individual models, I will still use Cycles. For lighting (In Cycles) I'm torn between Pro Lighting Studio and HDR Light Studio. For compositing I will use Fusion because I just found out that Nuke costs about $10000, while Fusion is free (with $299 for bonus features). I believe that the software I have chosen are all 3rd generation software; they are the future of 3d!
williamatics good to know that you have a plan :) looking forward to see your progress on this journey!
Don't really have anything to add to this, but speaking of Houdini Far Cry 5 was made using it. https://80.lv/articles/houdini-procedural-world-generation-of-far-cry-5/ The game has some amazingly beautiful scenery so that's a big plus for Houdini and the Far Cry devs.
Well, here is the thing, would you rather do everything you need to do for CG in one free program? Or Buy several programs and probably waste your money? If you want to spend over a grand on some programs go ahead. Who am I to stop you? But why buy several programs when there is one, That is free! that can do most if not all of that you are talking about.
lleothebest Blender simply can't do the things that Substance, Houdini, HDR Light Studio, and Terragen can do. Even if it could, it would take much longer. Since I would rather "waste" money than waste time, I will spend lots of money on other software.
It's pretty much the same reason that big studios use lots of different software instead of just one program.
williamatics I think that's a good way to approach it. I feel the same way. I'd rather find the program that can do something really really well than to try and learn how one program can do a lot "ok". For me Blender is a great Modeling/Sculpting/Animation tool, but beyond that I look at other software. Substance Painter is definitely my go to texturing tool. Photoshop for anything 2D related, Unity for game engine. I have been looking for a great terrain tool to be used in games and have looked into World Machine and Terragen as well.