Are you working with Houdini software and looking for some solution to speed up rendering time? One of the best solutions is to use a Houdini render farm. In this article today, Super Renders Farm will rank the top 4 best Houdini render farms and give you some suggestions for choosing the right one for your projects
What is Houdini?
Houdini SideFX is a 3D software for CG animations, films, games, and TV. It is one of the best 3D software in the world and provides powerful tool sets for features, including modeling, rigging, animation, particle effects, dynamics, compositing, integrated rendering, and more. Houdini SideFX utilizes a node-based procedural approach, which enables digital artists with an unprecedented level of power, flexibility, and control. Nowadays, Houdini is considered the future software of the 3D industry by many 3D artists and studios around the world.
Houdini can combine with many different renderers and use both CPU & GPU render. Some popular names of render engines utilize GPU rendering with Houdini like Redshift, and Octane. If you prefer CPU rendering, you can render Houdini with Mantra, Arnold, and V-Ray.
Although Houdini is a popular software, there is not much render farm support for it. Because of the specific factors related to the project as well as plugins or the extensibility of the project with Houdini. But we still have the famous Houdini render farms. So what is that? Let’s explore below!
1. Super Renders Farm
Super Renders Farm is a cloud rendering service that is based on SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) and IaaS (Infrastructure-as-a Service). They supported all major apps used by the industry 3dsMax, Maya, Blender, Houdini, SketchUp…
Super Renders Farm offers users two rendering methods: submit jobs to the render farm via Web or Desktop Client application. If you choose to use the Web, then you only need four steps after creating an account, uploading resources, submitting the job, analyzing the scene, and rendering. If you are using the Desktop Client application, they only support Windows operating systems, which allow you to submit render jobs directly from 3D applications such as Maya and 3ds Max.
Super Renders Farm based on the IaaS model. It allows users to control every aspect of rendering from choosing the hardware to installing software, plugins, and scripts, using their remote servers as your computer, and more. So, you can install any versions of Houdini (which run on Windows 10 or Linux …), and any renderers.
You can select a wide variety of service packages including CPU rental packages or GPU rental packages (namely GTX 1080 Ti, RTX 2080 Ti, RTX 3090, or RTX 4090 which are all the state-of-the-art and newest ones in the market). Using Super Renders Farm service will not limit your types of plugins, software version or GPU/CPU rendering.
2. 3S Cloud Render Farm
3S Cloud Render Farm, a versatile SaaS-based rendering solution, provides users with flexible file upload options: directly through a web browser, the efficient 3S Uploader tool, or seamlessly via popular external storage platforms like Google Drive and Dropbox. Remarkably, 3S Cloud is fully compatible with all versions of Houdini, catering to a broad spectrum of project requirements. This service distinguishes itself by offering two distinct rendering categories: GPU and CPU rendering, each backed by a comprehensive suite of rendering engines to meet diverse user needs.
3. Fox Render Farm
Fox Render Farm is one of the best famous render farms. It is a China render farm, established in 2009. Fox is the best choice for many 3D artists and studios around the world, and it is the service for many hits and blockbusters.
Fox Render Farm is based on a SaaS model. It allows proceeding with rendering on their website. Because it is a SaaS render farm, Fox just supports certain Houdini versions with render engines. And unfortunately, it does not support Plugins with Houdini at all. It is a con if your projects have scripts or plugins.
4. IRender
iRender allows you to set up your own working environment and install any application on their servers, ranging from Houdini 19.5. This also applies to several other rendering engines, but you’ll need to provide your own licenses.
Configuration: iRender offers multiple GPU packages from RTX 3090 to RTX 4090, each with 24 VRAM. Their servers also feature an AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro 3955WX CPU, 256 GB RAM, and a 2TB NVMe SSD. Additionally, they support NVLink for the RTX 3090.
Pricing: Prices start at $4.5 per hour per node and can go up to $28 per hour.
Summary
There are the 4 best Houdini render farms you should choose for your project. Each render farm has its own pros and cons. Your job is to select the suitable one. If your project is large-scale or has some special plugins or custom scripts, we recommend you use Super Renders Farm or IRender.