This R&D focuses on building a procedural metal-folding simulation system in Houdini, designed as an HDA for multi-shot production.

The main goal was to create a reusable setup that could take a pre-prepared spaceship or mechanical asset, connect it to the HDA, and generate the required folding, deformation, destruction, or impact simulation without rebuilding the setup from scratch for every shot.

Once the core system is established—including RBD setup, constraints, forces, inheritance logic, activation rules, and simulation controls—the workflow becomes much easier to reuse across a full sequence.

Instead of copying and manually modifying a large simulation network for every shot, artists can work from the same procedural system and mainly adjust exposed parameters to create shot-specific variations. If visual consistency is required, the same setup can simply be extended across a different frame range or adapted to a new animation.

This type of workflow is especially useful for productions involving repeated mechanical destruction, such as spaceship battles, aircraft damage, vehicle crashes, or large-scale combat sequences, where many shots share similar simulation requirements.

A major advantage of using an HDA is maintainability. Traditional copied setups can quickly diverge after multiple iterations or after being passed between different artists. A centralized procedural asset is more complex to build initially, but much easier to update, improve, and propagate across multiple shots.

This kind of tool allows a smaller FX team to handle a larger amount of work by shifting repeated technical setup into automation and reusable procedural logic, while still leaving enough control for artists to create unique results per shot.