Coraline story on Side Effects site

We just posted a great story about how Houdini was used in the almost entirely hand made stop motion project Coraline at LAIKA in Portland.



Great job to the LAIKA team and big thanks for helping us get this story out for the Houdini Community!

Side Effects visits Mumbai and Pune India!

Janet Fraser, Senior Account Executive from our Toronto office headed over to India a few weeks back with Jeff Wagner, Senior Technology Consultant and Richard Hamel, VP of Sales and Marketing.

(Richard, Janet and Jeff in India with the official red dot welcome)

They made it out to FICCI Frames 2009 in Mumbai on a trade mission with the Canadian government. At FICCI, Side Effects met with a number of studios and schools and were able to rub shoulders with some famous Bollywood stars and directors.

(Jeff and Janet at the FICCI Frames Ontario Booth)

(the SESI team with Part of the Canadian trade commission in front of the Taj)

Later, the SESI team traveled to Pune and met wtih the Mahratta Chamber of Commerce where they were invited to local studios and schools to present to and talk with Jeff Wagner.

(Janet and Jeff at Phoebus in Pune)

We hope to further help with education and training at studios in India.

thank YOU for the support

Yesterday an interesting link was getting passed around online and through IM conversations virally. Imagine our excitement when we found our name mentioned all over it!

The CG Community Survey for Upgrades in 09 mentioned Houdini and Side Effects as one of the better providers of technical support and maintenance amongst its sample size of prevalent 3D animation tools.

Hey now allow us to thank YOU our users and customers for being so open and favorable in your kind words about Houdini and Side Effects!

**minor typo:

XSI: The fact that daily builds are available, and the support staff is almost perfect, makes Houdini a great value. Even though annual support seems pricey, it is worth being able to contact SideFX any time with questions, and have access to major releases, not just daily, minor updates and bug fixes (which they're constantly working on!)

Slight company name overlook ;). But kudos to all the developers who work diligently to provide those daily builds and the Support staff who are so reactive to customer needs!

Great win for the DD Bacardi Sundance team!

(Charles-Felix, Nikos, and Phillip from Digital Domain pose with their statue)

David Robert and I attended the 7th Annual VES Awards this past Saturday. It was a great chance to see our nominated Houdini artists and support them at such a wonderful event.

Congratulations to Digital Domain's Bacardi Sundance team for their win of Outstanding Visual Effects in a Commercial!

Nikos Kalaitzidis, Zsolt Kajcsik, Phillip Prahal, Charles-Felix Chambert, Alex Thiesen, Jay Burton.

(Zsolt Kajcsik )

(With Nikos and Phillip after their win)

cmiVFX releases new DVD

Just a quick note to let you all know that cmiVFX has added yet another Houdini Tutorial DVD to their arsenal of learning tools.

We've posted an article on our homepage describing the curriculum and outline of the course that you might find handy.



Please visit www.cmivfx.com for more information!

Congratulations to all the VES nominated Houdini folks!

We'd like to announce that we are very proud of the following artists for their nominations at the 7th Annual Visual Effects Awards!



(please note: we have only mentioned names we are familiar with and know from the community. If you are a nominee in the Houdini community, we'd love to hear what project you worked on! Feel free to comment or write to community@sidefx.com)

• Andy Boyd from Method Studios
• Christoph Amman from Double Negative
• Dan Seddon from Framestore London
• David Mellor from Framestore NYC
• David Hulin from Framestore NYC
  
• Nikos Kalaitzidis form Digital Domain
• Jack Zaloga from Method Studios
• Jason Iversen from Rhythm & Hues
• Sho Hasegawa from Rhythm & Hues
• Spencer Lueders from Framestore NYC
• Zsolt Krajcsik from Digital Domain

David Robert (Account Manager for the Bay Area) and myself will be attending this year's ceremony to help support our users. Look for us in formal attire, and let's have a toast!

Stephen Tucker in LA

We have another visitor in LA from the great North (our Toronto office).

(Stephen Tucker and I posing for the blog)

Stephen did a fantastic Fluids tutorial a few months back, if you're interested see his infamous Shattered Glass work on the Side Effects Gallery.


Please remember to join Stephen and us up for a drink this Thursday at the HOUPLA Meetup in Los Angeles if you're around.

He will also be teaching a Workshop on Saturday, Intro to Variables + Expressions.

Local Event: Toronto

(Janet Fraser and some Houdini peeps at the Overdraught in Toronto)

If you're in the Toronto area don't forget to go meet up with the local Houdini Community with THUG at Overdraught restaurant!

date: Wednesday, February 18th, 2009
time: starting at 6pm EST
place: Overdraught restaurant and pub

156 Front Street West
Toronto, ON M5J 2L6, Canada
(416) 408-3925
map

Please note: A few key members of the Side Effects Staff are currently in India with FICCI Frames. Please contact us at community@sidefx.com if you'd like to organize a meeting.

Welcome to the Houdini Community Blog!

(from left to right: Georg Duemlein, Richard Hamel, Matt Welker, Rob Vinluan, Rachael Campbell, Cristin Barghiel, Leyla Tirgari, Jeff Lait, Graham Clark)

This is a place where the community of Houdini users can turn to see frequently updated information and links on all things related to Houdini software and the artists in the community using it.

Please check back regularly or subscribe to the feed to keep up with Side Effects events and participation in your local communities of interest.

If you have any information, news or links you'd like to submit for this blog, please contact community@sidefx.com.