Compounds are ICE nodes built from other nodes, including base nodes as well as other compounds.

You can use compounds to simplify and organize your ICE trees to make them easier to read and understand, but the real advantage of compounds is that you can export them and reuse them in other trees and scenes as well as share them with other users. Compounds replace presets for ICE nodes.

Softimage includes many pre-built compounds for performing specific tasks. These compounds are built from the same base nodes that are available for building your own compounds. You can edit the supplied compounds to see how they work. You can build variations of the supplied compounds, or create entirely new effects.

Here's the basic workflow for creating and using ICE compounds:

1. Select a portion of an ICE tree.

2. Convert the selected subtree into a compound. See Creating ICE Compounds.

3. Modify the compound as desired. See the following sections:

   • Editing Compounds.

   • Managing Exposed Ports.

   • Setting Compound Properties.

4. Export the compound. See Exporting Compounds.

5. Use the compound in other ICE trees and scenes. See Applying ICE Compounds.

6. If you need to make changes later, you can modify the compound and re-export it. See Versioning Compounds.