In this Renderman for Solaris tutorial, we look at the USD asset you can also download for free and set up a basic RenderMan pxrSurface shader. The project for this series builds on the Mari tutorial also using the same asset. We also look at how to convert textures in the Renderman texture manager and how to use an HDR dome light to light the asset. You can download the asset from Gumroad

About Renderman for Solaris

RenderMan supports the native USD “Solaris” workflows introduced in Houdini 18.  Solaris offers artists and TDs:

• Access to native USD for scene composition, variants, and overrides.  USD is a robust technology for building up assets, putting them into sets, and adding shot-specific details and animation.  It is a great pipeline tool.
• A new lighting toolset that allows artists to build lights into their USD scenes.
• Direct batch rendering of USD files via Houdini’s “husk” command-line renderer.

RenderMan provides a USD Hydra Renderer Delegate that allows artists to render interactively directly to the Solaris viewport.  Artists get immediate path-traced visual feedback during scene assembly, and adjustments to lighting, materials, and other scene attributes.  The same RenderMan Hydra Renderer Delegate is what also allows the “husk” command-line renderer.

As the SideFX builds on Solaris, RenderMan will continue to provide deep matching integrations to new features and capabilities.