houdini-animation

name	houdini-animation
description	Pipeline skill — typed timeline, keyframe, channel, and cache-baking tools. Query/set time, FPS and ranges; set/get/delete/list keyframes; inspect channels and expressions; export/import channel JSON; bake channels and trigger bounded simulation/cache renders. The canonical timeline API.
license	MIT
compatibility	dcc-mcp-houdini 0.1+, Houdini 20.5+, dcc-mcp-core 0.17+
allowed-tools	Bash Read Write Edit
metadata	{"dcc-mcp":{"dcc":"houdini","layer":"domain","stage":"pipeline","version":"1.0.0","tags":["houdini","animation","keyframe","channel","timeline","fps","bake","simulation","cache","pipeline"],"search-hint":"keyframe channel timeline frame range fps set time animation bake simulation cache expression","tools":"tools.yaml"}}

houdini-animation

Typed animation tools for agents. All tools are affinity: main.

Tool groups

• timeline: get_timeline, set_timeline — the canonical timeline query/setter. For interactive timeline edits prefer set_timeline over houdini_automation__set_frame_range (which remains for file-based batch flows).
• keyframes: set_keyframe, get_keyframes, delete_keyframes (destructive).
• channels: list_animated_parms, get_channel_info, export_channels, import_channels (JSON round-trip).
• bake (async): bake_channels (per-frame sample → constant keys, hard frame cap), cache_simulation (render a filecache/DOP/geometry ROP, report written_files + elapsed_secs).

Tracer-bullet flow

1. set_timeline(frame_range=[1,48], fps=24)
2. set_keyframe(node_path="/obj/geo1", parm_name="tx", frame=1, value=0)
3. set_keyframe(node_path="/obj/geo1", parm_name="tx", frame=48, value=10)
4. get_keyframes("/obj/geo1", "tx") → verify two keys
5. export_channels("/obj/geo1", ["tx"], "/tmp/tx.json") → import_channels to retarget
6. bake_channels("/obj/geo1", ["tx"], frame_range=[1,48]) to flatten expressions

cache_simulation is async with a 1-hour timeout hint; output-path parm names are probed defensively so File Cache, DOP I/O, and Geometry ROPs are all tolerated.