In nuce: As Shawn Olson, product owner for 3ds Max at Autodesk, announced on 28 October this year , the USD implementation in 3ds Max has been enriched with an update (USD for 3ds Max). It is said that thanks to several new core functions of the public beta of this version 0.3, 3ds Max and USD (Universal Scene Description) will move closer together. In his message, Olson explains the advantages of USD – and that it is not just a new file format, but also a programming interface that allows non-destructive collaboration across software boundaries. Last but not least, Shawn sees time and cost savings as convincing advantages of the Universal Scene Description.
In toto: Below are some of the most interesting new features that come with the update for the USD implementation in 3ds Max. For a complete list, see Shawn Olson’s announcement at area.autodesk.com – or the almost 40-minute video linked there, which demonstrates what version 0.3 of USD for 3ds Max (USD for 3ds Max) offers.
- New USD Stage Object: This allows a USD file to be loaded directly into 3ds Max. According to the announcement, this differs significantly from the method of loading USDs into 3ds Max as before – because USD Stage Objects are to be loaded into 3ds Max in a similar way to XRef scenes, with the difference that the source data is not 3ds Max data.
- The ShaderWriter has also been added, which allows users to control how an object is exported – beyond the limitations imposed by the standard export.
- Updates for the USD SDK (Software Development Kit): Users can now work with C , Python and Maxscript.
Clicked further: The graphic in the lead image of this news item was created by Environment Artist Ethan Olson, who works as a New World Environment Artist at Amazon Games .
Sources: cgpress.org ( message from CGPress Staff), area.autodesk.com ( message from Shawn Olson)
