[Sidefx-houdini-list] CAD to Houdini

[Jerry]

If you have maya, there is a route you can go which i've used a couple 
of times.
I've never tried it with trimmed surfaces though, but i'm sure there's a 
workaround if you can separate the
trims out.

Anyway it goes something like this.
Open the surfaces in U and V in maya, then convert to poly. export as an 
obj. Load obj into houdini then
convert to nurbs and close in U and V.

Is a bit cumbersome, but i've found it works pretty well.

Hope that helps

Jerry

John Coldrick wrote:

>On Monday 02 October 2006 09:19, Peter Robbinson wrote:
>  
>
>>I would try the .iges route next. That format is more closely associated
>>with CAD conversions and there are usually more options for
>>them to control the conversion.
>>    
>>
>
>	You'll need two things for this - possibly three.  We've just been through 
>this and ended up with(unfortunately) polys because we didn't have a lot of 
>control or time over the source files(originally ProE).  We got Polytrans, 
>which is great, but while it reads ProE files natively, that won't help you 
>get it to an IGES format readable by Houdini(esp with trim surfaces).  You 
>need to get IGES files saved out by whatever program is being used to design 
>the files, then run them through Polytrans, which has it's strength in being 
>able to beat up any of the hundreds of mangled IGES variants out there(and 
>there are hundreds).  Unfortunately, I'm not sure you'll be able to take 
>advantage of exporting into an IGES file readable by Houdini - you'll need to 
>import directly into Maya(!) because that's the only one they support 
>directly.  Getting it from Maya to Houdini may be troublesome in itself.
>
>	Bottom line, it's a bitch.  It *really* depends on the flavour of IGES, and 
>as mentioned the state of that format is a mess when going between packages.  
>You might try IGES and it will work first time.  It probably won't.  
>Importing IGES trim surfaces from Polytrans directly into Houdini resulted in 
>a mess.  Everyone complains about Houdini's handling of IGES, but after this 
>experience, at least I understand why.  The main guy at Polytrans has been 
>focused heavily on IGES for many years - it's a full time job.
>
>	Personally, I'd like to get the Polytrans guys talking to SESI, not sure when 
>that will happen though.  They're right here in town, guys.  :)
>
>	Cheers,
>
>	J.C.
>
>
>  
>