Autodesk open-sources Golaem for Houdini and Unreal Engine
Autodesk has open-sourced Golaem for Houdini, Golaem for Unreal Engine and Golaem for USD, its plugins for loading Golaem simulation caches procedurally inside other DCC apps.
Source code for the add-ons, which let users load character data from the Maya crowd simulation tool without having to bake the geometry, is available under an Apache 2.0 license.
In releated news, Autodesk has released Golaem 9.3.2, the latest version of the Maya edition.
An intuitive crowd animation tool making use of standard Maya workflows
Launched in 2011, Golaem was designed to provide an intuitive approach to crowd animation, with users able to use Maya’s native tools to control crowd behaviour.
Later updates added toolsets for building custom AI logic, generating automatic variations of crowd characters, and interactively previewing and editing simulations.
The software was acquired by Autodesk in 2024, and made available via its Media and Entertainment Collection last year.
Golaem 9.3.2: new Shader Attribute Override node
Since then, Autodesk has steadily put updates to the core Maya plugin: mostly bugfixes and small feature updates, although Golaem 9.3.1 introduced a new Golaem for Hydra plugin.
The latest release, last month’s Golaem 9.3.2 is similar, the only entirely new feature being a new Shader Attribute Override node in Character Maker geometry tab.
Open-source add-ons for loading Golaem simulations in Houdini or UE5 for rendering
However, alongside it, Autodesk has open-sourced the add-ons for Houdini, Unreal Engine and other USD-compatible applications.
They’re for rendering simulations created in Golaem for Maya in those applications, not creating new simulations, and make it possible to load simulation caches procedurally.
The workflow avoids having to bake out geometry, and handles geometry and shading variation and Golaem Layout edits inside the new host software.
Although open-sourcing software is sometimes a signal that it won’t receive further updates from the developer, that isn’t necessarily the case here.
Autodesk has been updating the add-ons since acquiring Golaem, but in practice, tends only to do so with every other major new version of the host software.
According to the release notes, the move makes it possible for studios that use unsupported newer versions of Houdini, Unreal Engine or USD to build the add-ons themselves.
Price and system requirements
Golaem 9.3.2 is compatible with Maya 2024+ on Windows 10+ and CentOS, RHEL, AlmaLinux and Rocky Linux 8.
Golaem for Houdini, Golaem for Unreal Engine and Golaem for USD are compatible with Golaem for Maya 7.2.3+. The source code is available under an Apache 2.0 license.
Golaem is available as part of Autodesk’s Media & Entertainment product bundle, which is available rental-only. Subscriptions cost $345/month or $2,790/year.
Read a full list of new features in Golaem 9.3.2 in the online changelog
Find source code for the Golaem extensions on Autodesk’s GitHub repository
Have your say on this story by following CG Channel on Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter). As well as being able to comment on stories, followers of our social media accounts can see videos we don’t post on the site itself, including making-ofs for the latest VFX movies, animations, games cinematics and motion graphics projects.