what if we need to different material for each types of instance object

Ah nice, glad I could help. Yeah there was a longer recording of it where I talk about trying to reference in the copy to points in Solaris directly, and it nearly bricking my whole PC. Fine if they're packed but then the attributes wouldn't work for me on the material. So instancing is the way to go.

You're very welcome!

Oh, absolutely. The framing of this tutorial was for the specific instance of having multiple packed objects, either custom debris or just merged objects that you'd typically wire into the Copy to Points with a variant attribute on the points, as that information wasn't obvious to me from any thing I was reading online. As in having multple objects coming in from SOPs to LOPs from an object merge in a SOP create. But really the power of the instancer comes from being able to reference in objects via USD and by using a similar method with the Collection set-up and dragging objects in, being able to instance them on points using just Solaris. It lets the renderer optimize the data going into it, rather then loading in unpacked scenes of billions of polygons. You're simply telling it here's these few objects, and they go on these points at these sizes and orientations. Try it yourself with something good and hi-poly and see how much you can render.

@@KevRyanCG but you can specify on the sop import how to instance (giving that you did a copy to points packing and instancing the pieces), so is there a benefit in doing so in solaris? I usually have it setup at obj level with a copy to points, pack and instance and then in solaris I just import that specifying "point instance" as the instance setting.

@@brencaaa Ah nice! I didn't know this. I just tried it there on another project I'm working on and it seems to be more or less the same. It's also circumvented an issue I was having with the instancer which kept crashing my scene. So I guess it just comes down to circumstances then. If you just need to do a handy copy to points and have that replicated as is in LOPS then using the Create Point Instancer option is the way to go. But if you wanted that extra bit of control at the LOP level, and to swap things out then at least the instancer is there. I can't remember which tutorial it was but to figure out what I needed I found a video where the guy was using the collections to bring in USD files and basically doing the majority of his work through the Solaris context. It'd be the same idea as folks who never use the seperate MAT or OUT contexts and instead create Material or ROP networks at the obj level, and I've worked with TDs who create nested networks and tools which have a ridiculous level of automation built in thanks to this. Nevertheless cheers for the tip Massimo! I'll be sure to mention it in a future video.

@@KevRyanCG Happy to hear that! I've always did it like that but I was wondering if there where benefits of doing so at LOPs level (coming from Redshift, I was curious to know if it worked like the "rs proxy workflow", basically instancing at render time instead of using packed prims, but it seems not to make a real difference, plus karma is way happier to work with packed prims than Redshift was)

I'm afraid I don't but when I made this tutorial it began as a windy forest scene I was messing with that I must return to at some point. Though the tutorial I was looking at for that is right here - kzfaq.info/get/bejne/hLOcjMmQuZ-ykmQ.html My specific tutorial was for the process of making all your instances in Houdini as merged packed objects so I could instance them, like for debris.

kzfaq.info/get/bejne/jbVzlrdqmKqUop8.html actually this one might be easier to follow. I'm going to have a go of it today.

​@@KevRyanCGthank you. I took advantage of having a long weekend and just completed part 3. It seems to be a decent approach, although looking in the comments section there are other folks who think that perhaps it's a bit cumbersome. But I have to say It's very effective. Certainly better than what I've done on my own. There's another gentleman named Josh Weber, who has put out a tutorial regarding animated instances although his tutorial has very poor audio. It's more of a casual mention than an actual structured tutorial. Difficult to follow / interpret.

​@@KevRyanCGha, that's on my list too!

@@tomallen5837 Man I've been on this all day and I can't really figure it out right. Best I did was make an instance set-up in Sops and referencing that in and creating native instances. There's some method with Value Clips that I just couldn't get to work, though I saw it on a sped up video on vimeo and it seems to be the way to do it. Sadly the artist didn't divulge too much more information. I'm going to look into it further then I'll make a video once I find out.