Deborah R. Fowler
Karma and Houdini - highlighting Material X and Karma
Posted Jan 25 2025Karma is the replacement for Mantra (as Mantra was not designed for USD files format). When discussing Karma, USD and Solaris should be mentioned.
This page quickly highlights basic texture assignment. Karma provides both cpu and xpu (gpu) options. In Houdini 20/20.5 Karma xpu is no longer in beta, it is gold. Karma cpu is production ready.
Other Karma Sections:
Material X and Textures/Noise
For a texture image you reference the file in the mtlx image node and you can simply plug it into the appropriate parameter including mtlx displaement
To apply a texture if you are using the Principled shader you simply put it in the Textures Tab in the appropriate parameter such as Displacement. There were also a noise displacement controls. If you are coming from Redshift you may be used to Maxon noise. Noise functions are available but need to have a few additional nodes added to your shader network to scale the noise. Below the mtlx noise node is plugged into the mtlx displacement however to control the scale a mtlx position vector and a mtlx multiply need to be added to adjust the position.
If you were to use Principled shader (which Karma cpu still respects) these would be found as follows:
