EVERYTHING PROCEDURAL
EPC2024
15-19 April 2024
CONFERENCE ON PROCEDURAL GENERATION FOR GAMES
meet and share knowledge
From Monday April 15 to Friday April 19 2024 Breda University of Applied Sciences will host the Everything Procedural Conference for a variety of lectures, talks, demonstrations and masterclasses in the field of procedural content generation for games on our beautiful campus. The event offers many opportunities to meet and share knowledge with fellow developers.
The first Everything Procedural Conference took place in 2016. In the years since we have gained strong recognition as a leading conference in the field of procedural content for games.
Conference
THURSDAY 18-04-2024
FRIDAY 19-04-2024
Procedural content generation in production
Today, with the growing appetite of players for new content, being able to adapt and renew game assets is key for live game sustainability. This session will look at the different ways procedural content generation was used in production, and in the live support of games, like Dead by Daylight and Jurassic Hunter at Behaviour Interactive. Vincent will share on the lessons Behaviour learn from these experiences and what are the strategies for future titles.
Vincent Villeneuve
Behaviour Interactive Rotterdam
Maurice Sibrandi
Behaviour Interactive Rotterdam
Monster Factory - PDG in Diablo IV
In this presentation Daniel will outline how Houdini and its Procedural Dependency Graphs (PDG) was used to mass produce content for Diablo IV’s Season 1 Malignant Monsters. This talk will dive into some of the production pipeline issues a typical art content team may face when producing content and how using procedural methods can greatly increase productivity with a much smaller amount of personnel. The presentation will also outline issues that may arise when performing mass automation and what steps could be taken to make the process manageable.
Daniel Maendel
Blizzard
Lightning fast level creation: procedural systems in Station to Station
Joost van Dongen
Founder and Creative Director at Galaxy Grove
Beyond Wave Function Collapse: Procedural Modeling without Tiles
Paul Merrell
Freelance
Story on a Skeleton of System
Storylets are short beats of story triggered by game state. They can provide highly tailored, responsive storylines, but may be more challenging to plan than a linear story. Emily will use examples from games including Fallen London to talk about how to match storylets to world state; keep reused storylets interesting; manage scope; analyse system dynamics; and polish the results.
Emily Short
Failbetter Games
TouchDesigner for creative Prototyping and Innovation
In this talk, Nikzad and Darien demonstrate TouchDesigner, a visual programming tool ideal for artists and designers. They show its use in creating interactive and immersive designs, blending digital media with physical elements through flexible integration of devices and sensors.
TouchDesigner supports various communication protocols for controlling lights, lasers, and more, facilitating rapid prototyping and innovation across creative fields. The session combines project showcases with insights into TouchDesigner’s operation, emphasizing its capacity to unlock creative potential and encourage exploration in multimedia applications.
Nikzad Arabshahi
Internodal
Darien Brito
Freelance Creative Coder
Reinforcement Learning for NPC Locomotion in Physics-Based Worlds
The talk explores the application of reinforcement learning (RL) to enhance non-player characters (NPCs) locomotion within physics-based virtual worlds. By leveraging RL, NPCs can autonomously adapt and improve their locomotion strategies, navigating complex terrains and interacting with obstacles in a physically plausible manner.
The discussion delves into the implementation of RL algorithms for NPC behavior learning and addresses challenges associated with learning diverse locomotion gaits using RL across various characters. Through case studies and demonstrations, we highlight how RL-driven locomotion enhances NPC realism, responsiveness, and adaptability in virtual worlds, offering a path towards more immersive gaming experiences.
Ali Ghadirzadeh (PhD)
Embark Studios
Making game characters come alive with Language Models
This talk will delve into Embark Studios’ innovative use of Language Models in games, particularly for enhancing character interactions. Rather than relying on the conventional method of predefined scripts, we will discuss how to use machine learning to create dynamic and engaging dialogues between characters and players. These interactions need to be context-aware and reflect the in-game environment for a more immersive experience. Furthermore, we’ll explore additional applications of Language Models in games.
Simone Zamboni
Embark Studios
Generating Wanderlost
Eli Segal
Wanderlost
Mighty Bridge: Procedural generation using Houdini for Star Citizen
An Houdini integration for the Star Engine and Star Citizen. In this presentation, Valentin will show you how we can increase the power of Houdini by using an integration based on micro services. This gives us full access to every aspects of the game editor directly from Houdini. It allows us to create a wide variety of tools, ranging in complexity, that speeds up content creation.
Valentin Caille
Cloud Imperium Games
Layer-Based Infinite Procedural Generation: Chunks and Context
Generating infinite worlds in chunks is a well-known concept, but there is a widespread misconception that the chunk-based approach precludes context: That it can’t be used deterministically with algorithms where the surroundings of a chunk affects the chunk itself. In this session Rune presents principles for a layer-based approach where chunks can make use of contextual information, and where algorithms can plan arbitrarily large-scale features with intent. Implemented examples include natural looking paths generated with path-finding which seamlessly cross chunk boundaries, and road signs showing the way to locations far outside of the currently generated geometry.
Rune Skovbo Johansen
Independent Game Developer
Ten Years of Tech Art for Marvel's Spider-Man
A look at the evolution of procedural content creation at Insomniac Games across multiple ‘Marvel’s Spider-Man’ titles culminating in ‘Marvel’s Spider-Man 2. Attendees will gain insight into how artists at Insomniac Games leverage procedural techniques to create compelling open worlds for epic Marvel adventures and how those techniques have evolved over the past decade.
Xray Halperin
Insomniac Games
Parametric Design with Blender
Blender’s inherent parametricism via modifiers and geometry nodes allows to create procedural geometry set ups that significantly improve the quality of potential geometrical families. Within architecture, this means being able to quickly adjust a part of a model that could then adjust the full massing. With the end goal in mind, procedural geometry allows iterating at a faster pace to get to the right idea, as in design there is no shortcut but to keep iterating until the right solution presents itself.
Dimitar Pouchnikov
UH Studio and UH Studio Design Academy
Procedurally generate your game level with Unreal
A breakdown of the latest features of the Procedural Content Generation tool in Unreal. PCG tool will be used in a practical example to generate environments, paths, and other game elements.
Joseph Azzam
Romero Games
Framestore and Wonka’s Procedural Chocolate Factory
For the final sequence of Wonka, we had to create his Chocolate Factory popping into existence in the ruins of a castle. We used Houdini procedural modelling and layout techniques in combination with traditional VFX workflows to allow us to achieve this in the relatively short time allowed and to give flexible creative control to the client for the ending of the film. In this talk, we will show the various procedural tools we created and show some of the unique challenges of procedural workflow in a film VFX context.
Simon Carlile
Framestore
RealBiomes - Proceduralism in Practice
Jan and Johan from RealBiomes will present a high level, practical talk about high end biome procedural creation. They explain why proceduralism is incredibly useful for natural environments. They touch on the end user workflow via our BiomePainter and walk through the creation of an environment from scratch. Besides they will talk about the challenges they ran into and future possibilities. This is not a deep technical talk, but intended to give an overview about user experience, challenges and use cases.
Jan Klasen
RealBiomes
Johan Storkersen
RealBiomes
Lidar to Level: Procedurally Generating Environments from Real-World Point Cloud Data
Q3D Studios discusses how they utilise high fidelity lidar scans to procedurally create 3D digital twin models of iconic race tracks. In the world of Formula One, driver-in-the-loop simulators play a vital role of car development, with accuracy of track model details being a high priority and a particular area of focus for the team. They will explain their usage of custom Houdini Digital Assets to extract as much real-world data from the point cloud as possible to assure accuracy and visual realism.
Andy Footman
Q3D Studios ltd
George Pennyfather
Q3D Studios ltd
MASTERCLASSES
WaveFunctionCollapse with Tessera
TUESDAY 16-04-2024
wednesday 17-04-2024
WaveFunctionCollapse is a generation technique based on finding solutions to a set of user-specified constraints. Tessera is a Unity-based asset for a flexible and featureful implementation of the algorithm, with an easy painting-based configuration. In this workshop, we’ll learn what it is capable of, how to design and debug generations and see how the tool can be used as part of a larger system.
Adam Newgas
BorisTheBrave
Houdini Beginner - Crafting a Lava Cave with Houdini and Unreal Engine
MONDAY 15-04-2024
TUESDAY 16-04-2024
WEDNESDAY 17-04-2024
In this three-day Masterclass, attendees learn the fundamental basics of Houdini, Houdini Engine for Unreal Engine and how to use HDA tools in Unreal levels. They will learn about the fundamentals of making terrains in Houdini, gain a solid understanding of how to approach creating their own procedural fracturing system using various Voronoi fracture methods, and learn about various approaches to displacement in Houdini.
This masterclass will be on-site and run over the course of three days (Monday to Wednesday) from 9:00 to 17:00. To participate you need to bring your own laptop or hardware. Tickets include drinks, lunch and a conference ticket.
Project GROT: Introduction to Houdini
This workshop covers the basics of Houdini. It includes a general overview, navigating the interface, placing nodes, and using basic attributes. The focus is on using Houdini for Game Art and Development, showing some frequently used geometry nodes with example use cases and an overview of the Game Development Toolset. The class extends to practical application by guiding participants on installing Houdini Engine for Unreal Engine and utilizing HDA tools within Unreal levels. During the session, participants explore Houdini tools from the Unreal Starter Kit and get guided through the process of constructing a level directly in Unreal Engine using these tools.
Lea Kronenberger
Frictional Games
Project GROT: Creating Procedural Ruins
Explore procedural modeling techniques with Julian Bragagna in this Houdini workshop crafted for beginners. Participants discover how to create a procedural ruins generator with an alien twist, diving into the world of Voronoi fracturing. Engage in hands-on learning, gaining a deeper understanding of techniques to control diverse fracture methods and transform basic Unreal Engine blockouts into intricate and unique structures. Throughout this session, the focus centers on the core fundamentals to create designs reminiscent of Project Grot, with little to no coding required! Attendees also learn the tricks behind crafting an organic-looking flesh cluster system, adding a captivating layer of detail to their concrete ruin. Join for an immersive experience that demystifies Houdini and procedural modeling, enhancing skills in 3D design and game development.
Julian Bragagna
Cloud Imperium Games
Project GROT: Building Vulcanic Terrains
This is a masterclass focusing on using the terrain tools of Houdini, to build a volcanic terrain. Attendees are guided through the powerful capabilities of Houdini, step by step will the procedural setup be build. Participants learn the art of creating heightfields to craft diverse landscapes, from rolling hills to jagged mountains, employing techniques that breathe life into their digital worlds. Another part of the class will be talking about adding lava into the terrain. Of the many ways to do this we will look into using simulations tool to get a interesting and realistic result. Through hands-on demonstrations and insightful instruction, attendees gain invaluable skills to elevate their terrain creation and simulation power in Houdini.
Simon Verstraete
Simon Houdini
Project GROT: Rock displacement workflows
Learn how to create a rock displacement tool in this beginner friendly workshop. Participants will gain an understanding about the basics of texture based displacement, and the requirements for creating a game ready mesh. Various solutions to the same problem are shown to gain a deeper understanding and to spark creativity within the attendees. The rock tool used in the Project Grot is broken down and explained in simple terms. This will show how the concepts discussed in the workshop can be applied to create a production ready tool for Unreal. By the end, the participants will have the prerequisite knowledge to create a rock tool of their own. There will be time to ask any questions about the topics discussed or anything Houdini related.
Marn Schokker
Electric Square
Houdini Intermediate - Procedural Open World Environments with Houdini and Unreal Engine
MONDAY 15-04-2024
TUESDAY 16-04-2024
WEDNESDAY 17-04-2024
At the end of this three-day Masterclass, attendees will have a detailed procedural landscape they can explore in Unreal. Attendees will leave with an understanding of procedural landscape workflows and how to create useful landscape tools. They will have learned how to use splines created in Houdini to drive Unreal Landscape Splines to efficiently spawn meshes and deform the terrain. Besides they will have a workflow setup using Houdini to generate procedural buildings in Unreal.
This masterclass will be on-site and run over the course of three days (Monday to Wednesday) from 9:00 to 17:00. To participate you need to bring your own laptop or hardware. Tickets include drinks, lunch and a conference ticket.
Pegasus Workshop: Procedural Landscapes
In this workshop, Ian will demonstrate how to create detailed procedural landscapes in Houdini. Attendees will learn how to utilize Houdni’s heightfield tools, taking basic primitives and creating a realistic natural landscape using noise and erosion. They’ll also learn how to create Houdini Digital Assets to aid in the creation of detailed masks and colour maps. The workshop’s goal is to provide an understanding of the Project Pegasus landscape workflow and give participants the confidence to build their own tools to enhance their projects.
Ian Smith
SideFX
Pegasus Workshop: Instances & Splines
In this workshop, George will demonstrate how to decorate the Pegasus Landscape with paths, tracks and vegetation using splines and points sent from Houdini to Unreal.
George Hulm
SideFX
Pegasus Workshop: Procedural Architecture
During this session Feike will go through different problem solving steps: Describing the problem, finding reference material & defining the solution. Afterwards they will learn how to translate the prior into a digital asset.
Feike Postmes
DodoDevs
Houdini Advanced - Mastering Houdini: Advanced Techniques and Workflows
MONDAY 15-04-2024
TUESDAY 16-04-2024
WEDNESDAY 17-04-2024
In this three-day Masterclass, attendees will learn about procedural pipelines using SideFX Houdini in a gaming context from various leaders in the field.
This masterclass will be on-site and run over the course of three days (Monday to Wednesday) from 9:00 to 17:00. To participate you need to bring your own laptop or hardware. Tickets include drinks, lunch and a conference ticket.
Crafting World Building Pipelines with the Massive Worlds Toolkit
You will learn how to build a custom tool that uses the power of the Massive Worlds Toolkit, a framework for interfacing Houdini x Unreal.
Erwin Heyms
Fracture Labs
Building Plugins and Integrations for Houdini
In this practical session, the presenter explores the process of integrating widely-used software tools with Houdini through Python programming. The focus is on providing concrete strategies for writing software integrations, aimed at content creators looking to enhance their use of Houdini for various projects. Attendees will learn how to use Python to connect and automate tasks within Houdini, improving efficiency and enabling more complex creative endeavours. This presentation will include examples of Python scripts for Houdini, tips for troubleshooting common integration challenges, and guidance on how to customize these solutions for specific needs. By the end, participants will have a clear understanding of how to leverage Python to make their work in Houdini more dynamic and productive.
Paul Ambrosiussen
Bismuth Consultancy B.V.
VITRUVIUS: Road Networks
This workshop is NOT about Vitruvius! – not the Roman architect and engineer that lived a long, long time ago. Vitruvius is the SideFX Labs set of tools that deal with architecture elements such as road networks, city layouts, and building structures. This workshop is focused on the generation of connections that drive the road networks. Knowledge of Latin is not required.
Christos Stavridis
SideFX
Unreal Python States | Custom Editor Modes for Houdini Tools
Learn how the brand new scriptable tools framework in Unreal can be exploited in tandem with Houdini Engine to create well integrated tools that take full advantage of the strengths of both software packages. Learn how to stop and start Houdini sessions programmatically via blueprints, set parameters and inputs, and instantiate and cook HDAs. Discover how mouse-clicks and brush strokes in the viewport can gather information in the scene and send that information to Houdini for processing in the background. Build tools that work in real-time in Unreal Engine with full-context, and unlock the full potential of Houdini inside Unreal.
Feike Postmes
Dododevs
George Hulm
Undini
AIAIAI - Don't You Worry (Yet)
This session will focus on real world workflows incorporating AI techniques and their application(s) within Houdini, not only for image generation.
Moritz Schwind
Entagma
Breaking the COPs barrier: Procedural Modeling and Texturing in Houdini
In this Masterclass Daniel Maendel guides you though a 3D game asset production pipeline entirely within Houdini. Utilizing intermediate to advanced procedural modeling and texturing methods, he shows how to produce a low-res mesh with textures that can be brought into any modern game engine. During the class several Houdini contexts are featured with a special emphasis on Surface to Compositing Operator data conversion methods to give us increased performance and flexibility while developing a high-resolution texture result. We explore how to configure the viewport and lights to give a beautiful and nearly instant preview while developing the asset and along the way he touches on Houdini network creation etiquette, organization, and methods for how to reduce our cook times.
Daniel Maendel
Blizzard
Building a scalable terrain biome pipeline
In this presentation Twan walks you through the process of setting up a pipeline for controlling biomes on a terrain from scratch. Biomes can help you with the design of a landscape in a high-level way. They can for example be used to control the material designation of your terrain or drive logic in other parts of your pipeline. The goal of the pipeline is to create a very scalable system, by separating out some external data and to use that to control the logic inside Houdini. The pipeline of this masterclass is created using mainly the VEX and Python languages in Houdini. Both heightfields and polygons are used in this workshop to show the strength of both workflows.
Twan de Graaf
Ubisoft
Reconstructing assets from JSON data
JSON is a widely used data format that can be used read and write data from Houdini using Python. This masterclass will dive into a technique I used in production to instance geometry to pointclouds in Houdini by importing JSON data from a proprietary game engine and processing it using Python in Houdini.
Xray Halperin
Insomniac Games
Introduction to Houdini Development Kit
This workshop introduces you to the Houdini Development Kit (HDK) which will allow you to extend and customize Houdini beyond what you can normally do. Learning about HDK will also equip you with more insights into how Houdini works behind the scene. While this is a deep and extensive topic, the workshop focuses on a few fun and practical examples to get your started. The goal is to make you feel ready and confident for your own future explorations.
Mai Ao
SideFX
STUDENT SHOWCASE
FRIDAY 19-04-2024
JELLYFISH IN HOUDINI
Sahar Yousefi is a second-year student at Breda University of Applied Sciences, specializing in technical art and procedural creation.
She will present her latest Houdini project: a tool to generate fully procedural jellyfishes, from geometry to animation and materials, based on biological research and physical simulation, with a high degree of parameter-based customization.
Sahar Yousefi
Breda University of Applied Sciences
Castle Wall Generator
Seb van den Beemt is a third-year student at Breda University of Applied Sciences, specializing in technical art and procedural generation.
Seb will present his procedural destroyed castle wall generator. There will be a rough breakdown of how the tool procedurally models and textures castle walls, alongside its implementation in Unreal Engine. He will also show how Unreal’s new PCG system was used to enhance the scene.
Seb van den Beemt
Breda University of Applied Sciences
Generating landscapes with noise
Ferri and Santiago are second-year students at Breda University of Applied Sciences, specializing in tools and game engine programming.
They will share insight in how they created a noise based toolchain to create organic landscapes in their multi-platform custom game engine.
Ferri de Lange & Santiago Broncas Bernardino
Breda University of Applied Sciences
Garden Creation with PCG
Maze Pressler is a third-year student at Breda University of Applied Sciences, specializing in Technical Game Design & Art.
Maze will share his expertise on Unreal Engine 5’s PCG to create a procedural garden generator. The presentation will cover the setup, insights into PCG and transferring Houdini’s procedural concepts to PCG Blueprints.
Maze Pressler
Breda University of Applied Sciences
Castle Building Tool
Lukáš Gallo is a third-year student at Breda University of Applied Sciences, specializing in technical art and procedural generation.
Originally designed as a simple tower generator, the tool evolved into something much bigger. Lukáš will dive into its development, revealing how it turned into a versatile instrument that enabled him to build an entire castle, inspired by a real-world reference with just a single tower generation tool.
Lukáš Gallo
Breda University of Applied Sciences
Delaunay Pattern Generation
David Heer is a third-year student at Breda University of Applied Sciences, specializing in technical art and procedural generation.
David will showcase his exploration of generating animated patterns using Delaunay triangulation. From starting as a learning exercise in VEX scripting, the project demonstrates how Houdini can be used to easily create visually interesting results from simple interactions.
David Heer
Breda University of Applied Sciences
GENERATING LOOT RIVER
This talk will delve into techniques and approaches used for procedural generation in ‘Loot River’, including unsuccessful attempts and mistakes made during development.
Miro Straka
Starka Studios
GENERATING LOOT RIVER
This talk will delve into techniques and approaches used for procedural generation in ‘Loot River’, including unsuccessful attempts and mistakes made during development.
Miro Straka
Starka Studios
GENERATING LOOT RIVER
This talk will delve into techniques and approaches used for procedural generation in ‘Loot River’, including unsuccessful attempts and mistakes made during development.
Miro Straka
Starka Studios
JOIN OUR NEWSLETTER
Discount is provided for students, alumni and group tickets. Please provide the correct promotion code at checkout.
BUAS2024EPC – For BUas students
ALU2024EPC – For BUAS alumni
STU2024EPC – For students
WHERE TO FIND US
- Monseigneur Hopmansstraat 2, 4817 JS Breda