Tools

Auto-builds Karma MaterialX materials for single FBX props in Houdini (Solaris). Groups a flat textures folder by material prefix, builds an mtlxstandard_surface subnet per material, and assigns each to the matching GeomSubset or mesh. One prop = one FBX + its textures folder.

– Download the latest version from the latest Release.
– Locate your Houdini user preferences folder and the packages folder inside it (create packages if it doesn't exist yet):
   Windows: C:/Users/<name>/Documents/houdini22.0/packages/
   macOS: ~/Library/Preferences/houdini/22.0/packages/
   Linux: ~/houdini22.0/packages/
– Unzip straight into packages so you get packages/prop_material_creator.json next to packages/PropMaterialCreator/.
– Restart Houdini. A Prop Mat button appears on the CGA Tools shelf.

Converts a character's FBX (mesh + separate animation, same skeleton) into a self-contained UsdSkel .usdc in Houdini (Solaris). Builds the SOP FBX Character Import → nulls → SOP Import UsdSkel Character → USD ROP chain automatically, with Subset Attributes pre-set for per-material assignment.

— Download the latest version from the latest Release.
— Locate your Houdini user preferences folder and the packages folder
inside it (create it if it doesn't exist):
  Windows: Documents/houdiniXX.X/packages/
  macOS: ~/Library/Preferences/houdini/XX.X/packages/
  Linux: ~/houdiniXX.X/packages/
— Unzip straight into packages/, so you get packages/fbx_to_usdc.json and
packages/FbxToUsdcConverter/.
— Restart Houdini. A CGA Tools shelf button "FBX>USDC" appears.
— The tool is self-updating: use the "Check for updates" button in its panel.

What it does:
— Handles the common two-file setup: mesh+skeleton in one FBX, the animation
clip in another, on the same skeleton.
— "Detect from Animation FBX" reads the clip's real frame range — the same
frame numbers the animator sees, not Houdini's scene defaults.
— "Shift animation to start at frame 0" retimes clips that start at an
arbitrary frame.
— Batch Convert: a table of clips converted in one pass, with per-row range
detection. Optionally chains the results into one assembled stage and cleans
up the scratch nodes.
— Exports with Flatten Stage, so each .usdc is a single portable file.

Auto-builds Karma materials for characters in Houdini (Solaris). Walks a folder of per-material subfolders, builds MaterialX graphs, and assigns them to meshes and GeomSubsets.

– Download the latest version from the latest Release.
– Locate your Houdini user preferences folder and the packages folder inside it (create packages if it does not exist yet):

Windows: C:/Users/<name>/Documents/houdini22.0/packages/
macOS: ~/Library/Preferences/houdini/22.0/packages/
Linux: ~/houdini22.0/packages/ (use your actual version)

Extract the zip directly into that packages folder, so you get:
houdini22.0/
└── packages/
    ├── character_mat_tool.json
    └── CharacterMaterialTool/
        ├── VERSION
        ├── python/
        ├── config/
        └── scripts/

No renaming needed - the zip is already laid out correctly.
Restart Houdini. A CGA Tools shelf tab appears with a Char Mat button.