Houdini 12.5 
offers a wealth of new and enhanced features including Cloud FX , Ocean FX, OpenVDB volume sculpting tools and an optimized lighting and rendering pipeline with built-in support for delayed-load Alembic primitives.


Performance
Houdini 12 has been re-architectured to be faster and more memory efficient. From a new geometry engine, to targeted optimizations to dynamics and rendering, to viewport enhancements, artists will be able to accomplish more and iterate faster with Houdini 12.5

Built on a powerful new geometry engine, Houdini includes targeted optimizations to dynamics and rendering and a reworked OpenGL 3 viewport. Houdini also includes Bullet solver integration, Pyro FX 2, faster more accurate FLIP fluids, production-ready cloth, an Alembic exporter and more.


Rendering
Houdini’s Mantra renderer, recently recognized with a Scientific and Technical Achievement award from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, now brings physically-based rendering to volumes such as smoke and fire. Mantra also includes a 300 times speed improvement when instancing to points.