Houdini 22: The Official Keynote of 30 Years of Software

SideFX officially presented Houdini 22, one of the most important releases in recent years for the famous procedural software used in the VFX, animation, motion graphics and game development sectors.

During a keynote lasting over two hours, held in London (available on YouTube), the development team illustrated the main new features of the release, demonstrating how Houdini continues to evolve to meet the new needs of the industry without sacrificing its procedural philosophy.

30 Years of Houdini

The event also represented an important historical milestone: in 2026 Houdini celebrates its thirtieth anniversary.

From the first commercial release until today, SideFX software has become one of the most popular tools for the creation of visual effects, simulations and procedural-based pipelines, finding application in film productions, TV series, video games and digital visualization.

In the keynote, SideFX thanked its community and reiterated the goal that has always guided the development of the software: to offer artists flexible and controllable tools capable of increasing creativity and production efficiency.

The two main directions of Houdini 22

Most of the new features presented revolve around two strategic areas: Gaussian Splatting and Machine Learning.

Gaussian Splatting becomes production-ready

After the experimental introduction in Houdini 21, support for Gaussian Splats reaches a level suitable for professional productions.

Gaussian Splatting is a three-dimensional representation technique that uses millions of Gaussian rays to reconstruct and render complex scenes with high visual quality and very competitive performance. In recent years, it has established itself as one of the most exciting technologies for reconstructing 3D environments and assets.

In Houdini 22, support is no longer limited to visualization and rendering: artists can create, edit, animate, and integrate Gaussian Splats within existing procedural workflows.
SideFX has also significantly improved viewport and rendering performance, opening up new creative and production possibilities.

AI and Machine Learning integrated into the procedural workflow

SideFX's approach to artificial intelligence is distinguished by its focus on artistic control and integration into existing pipelines.

Rather than relying on fully automated systems, Houdini 22 introduces tools that allow you to leverage third-party models like Detectron and Segment Anything Model (SAM) within the traditional node-based environment.

The goal is to provide flexible, reproducible and customizable tools, while maintaining full control of the creative and production processes.

KineFX and APEX: the maturity of the character pipeline

One of the most significant advances concerns the ecosystem dedicated to digital characters.

With Houdini 22, KineFX and APEX reach a level of integration and maturity that allows you to more efficiently tackle tasks such as:

Rigging
Character animation
Motion mixing
Retargeting
Creature workflows

The demos presented show an increasingly complete and competitive pipeline for the creation and management of complex characters, while maintaining the flexibility typical of the procedural approach.

CFX: hair, fur and muscle simulations

The Character FX area receives important updates.

SideFX has introduced significant optimizations for the simulations of:

Hair
Fur
Muscles
Secondary motion

New tools for managing crowd simulations and deformation systems were also demonstrated, with a particular focus on performance and production scalability.

Copernicus grows and becomes increasingly central

Copernicus is probably one of the systems that receives the most updates in Houdini 22.

Among the main new features we find:

Advanced texture synthesis.
2D and 3D painting tools.
Integration with Machine Learning workflows.
New physics solvers.
Procedural generation of terrains and environments.

A particularly important change concerns the migration of the Terrain and Heightfield tools within Copernicus.
According to SideFX, this step enables performance improvements that can reach up to five times the speed of previous implementations, as well as offering a more consistent and modern workflow.

Solaris and Karma consolidate their maturity

Solaris also continues its evolutionary path.

SideFX's USD-based platform further expands the tools dedicated to:

Layout
Set dressing
Lighting
Look development
World building

The new procedural scattering capabilities and extended support for RBD and Hydra simulations make Solaris an increasingly complete solution for the construction of complex environments.

In parallel, Karma continues its maturation path as a production renderer, consolidating its role within the Houdini ecosystem.

New Vulkan interface and viewport

Among the most significant innovations at the infrastructure level we find the revamp of the user interface.

The new UI based on Qt and QML represents much more than a simple aesthetic update: it constitutes a modern platform that will allow SideFX to develop new user experiences and more advanced tools in future releases.

The viewport also takes a major step forward with the complete migration to Vulkan, using MoltenVK on macOS.

The definitive abandonment of legacy components based on OpenGL brings several advantages:

Greater stability.
More modern and maintainable code.
Improved performance.
Solid foundation for future real-time workflows.

Other noteworthy new features

Other updates showcased during the keynote also include:

Improvements to VFX tools.
Expanded support for Gaussian Splats in a variety of environments.
General performance optimizations.
Faster workflows for iteration and prototyping.

The five key takeaways from Houdini 22

For those who want a quick summary, these are probably the most significant aspects of the release:

Gaussian Splatting is finally ready for professional productions.
Copernicus evolves into a complete platform for texture and terrain generation.
KineFX and APEX further mature the character pipeline.
Solaris and Karma reach an ever-higher level of maturity.
The migration to Vulkan prepares Houdini for the future needs of the real-time industry.

Conclusions

Houdini 22 does not simply introduce new features, but consolidates a clear strategic direction: integrating emerging technologies such as AI and Gaussian Splatting within a mature and highly controllable procedural ecosystem.

The release demonstrates a strong investment in both the production aspects and the technological foundation of the software, confirming SideFX's commitment to building tools designed for professionals who operate in increasingly complex and interdisciplinary contexts.

For VFX artists, animators, technical directors, environment artists and developers, Houdini 22 is poised to be one of the most significant releases in recent years.

Below is the full keynote: