September 16, 2020

Owned by Cory Omand
Last updated: Sept 16, 2020
5 min read

Video Conference Link

Attendance

Cory Omand - WG Chair, Pixar/TWDS
Alan Blevins, Dreamworks
Alex Schwank, Apple
Aloys Baillet, Animal Logic
Andy Biar,  Warner Bros.
Anandhaiyappan, Botvfx
Arash Keissami, Nira.app
Ben Chung-Hoon, Google
Bill Spitzak, Dreamworks Animation
Brian Green, Dreamworks
Carson Brownlee, Intel
Charles Fleche, Rodeo FX
Chris Rydalch, Blue Sky Studios
Daniel Heckenberg, Animal Logic
David Aguilar, Walt Disney Animation
Deke Kincaid, Digital Domain
Dhruv Govil, Apple
Doug MacMillan, Tippett Studio
Eoin Murphy, NVidia
Eric Enderton, NVidia
Francois Lord, Rodeo FX
Gary Jones, Foundry
Gordon Bradley, Autodesk
Greg Wuller, AWS
Henry Vera, DNEG
James Pedlingham, Foundry
Jeff Bradley, Dreamworks
John Hood, SPI
John Mertic, Linux Foundation
Jordan Soles, Rodeo FX
JT Nelson, Pasadena Open Source Consortium/SoCal Blender group
Kimball Thurston, Weta
Larry Gritz, SPI
Lee Kerley, SPI
Luca Scheller, RiseFX
Mark Elendt, SideFX
Mark Final, Foundry
Mark Tucker, SideFX
Mathieu Mazerolle, Foundry
Matthew Levine, WDAS
Matthew Low, DWA
Michael B. Johnson, Apple
Michael Kass, NVidia
Michael Min, Netflix
Niall Redmond, Foundry
Nick Porcino, Pixar
Nicolas Montmarquette, Autodesk
Philippe Sawicki, Autodesk
Pilar Molina Lopez, Blue Sky Studios
Pier Paolo Ciarravano, MPC
Richard Lei, Weta
Robin Rowe, CinePaint
Roman Zulak, SPI
Rory Woodford, Foundry
Sean Looper, AWS
Sean McDuffee, Intel
Serguei Kalentchouk, Apple
Shawn Dunn, Epic Games
Sue Sauer, Sunrise Productions
Toby Jones, Walt Disney Animation Studios

Minutes

  • Action item follow-up (0:05-0:10)

    • Wiki content review (Cory O.)

      • JT: should we be adding content to the content guide?

      • CoryO: If there are categories of content that are not represented in the wiki, feel free to add to the content guide, but please add the actual content to new pages in the wiki rather than inline in the guide.

      • JT: Is there a facility fo sandbox pages in the wiki? Sometimes it's easier to draft a new page elsewhere then move it into the right spot in the wiki.

      • CoryO: You can use your personal space (wiki.aswf.io/display/~$USER) for that purpose.

  • Discussion: guided vs. self-organized standards (0:10-0:35)

    • How does the USD team view external self-organized standardization around USD extensions?

      • There are many domains in which Pixar may not have a vested interest, so the team acknowledges that this activity is going to happen, and has no need to be involved in the discussions. At some point, if there is a need in a particular area, Pixar may look to the community to understand what prior art may exist. At that point, community organized standards and/or extensions may be considered for inclusion in the core (subject to discussion with the originators).

      • CoryO: We can consider making this working group a place to hold discussions of this type, where we maintain a list of potential discussions and schedule them as necessary in the WG.

      • GordonB: Would it be useful to split these discussions into sub-working groups that do more deep investigation?

        • CoryO: Definitely would be useful; still having the key stakeholders present the idea to the USDWG, but then WG members could identify the need for more discussion into the proposal, and that activity would be handled by a sub-working group.

      • CoryO: Should we consider a language change to the group charter to make it clear that these sorts of discussions are appropriate to plan in this WG?

        • JT: Seems like it would be good clarification, so it's clear where these proposals should be directed, which has been problematic in other groups.

      • JT: Are there any conferences attended by the USD team that we could leverage?

        • CoryO: there are typically USD activities at SIGGRAPH (this year excepted). It would be good to examine future USD/ASWF conference opportunities to cast a wider net for conversations of this type.

      • CoryO: WBN to have a wiki page that allows people to propose sessions for discussion, along with proposed stakeholders, to give the WG a pool of topics to schedule as those putting forth proposals are ready to present.

    • What is the best way to support discoverability of USD extension projects?

      • CoryO: For community-driven standards and the like, including this information in the USDWG wiki would be the best way of supporting discoverability.

    • What is the role of the USD repo for extension proposals?

      • CoryO: If someone would like their extension included in the USD core, raising an issue in the USD GitHub is likely the best way to get this in front of the USD team.

      • JT: In other projects, initial proposals in the form of issues can be followed up, at the discretion of the team, as draft PRs on the project with edits to a proposal as well as proposed changes to the code.

    • What is the best way to organize external contributions? Branch in the USD repo, contrib repo, individual repos?

      • CoryO: As the USD team has been seeking to reduce the size and dependency count of the core, individual repos are still likely the best way for external projects to be managed, vs. trying to add them into the official USD repo. Branches in the USD repo would be useful for the draft PR workflow suggested above, but getting buy in from the USD team via discussion on an issue is the first step.

    • AlanB: Do others have a good solution for building open-sourced USD extensions against USD?

      • BillS: difficult to write and install schemas, need to extend the PXR namespace?

      • CoryO: If you're having a particularly difficult time of it, it might be worth filing a GitHub issue.

      • RichardL: We have a fairly good solution in our custom build system at Weta, haven't had difficulties building schemas.

      • NickP: The USD Cookbook, linked from Index, has good examples for how to build USD plugins.

      • CoryO: Will loft that link up to the front page for better visibility.

  • Discussion: USD in vfxplatform? (0:35-0:58)

    • CoryO: Discussed with the Pixar team, and it may be good to have an idea of what USD version vendors should target for each year's VFX platform. Which version that should be could be part of the deliverables of this group.

    • MichaelM: Given the aspirational nature of the vfx platform, and the mix of actual dependencies that we see in the set of tools used in studio pipelines, it may be difficult to determine a single version of USD to target.

    • NickP: Inclusion in the platform could make management of the project more difficult for Pixar, given that there may be many platform versions in play. Inclusion in the platform might mean that the team has to go back and maintain older versions, if someone happens to be using tools that support a much older standard.

    • AlanB: It might be better to know the reverse; which VFX platforms a partciular release of USD works with (or probably works with).

    • GordonB: Autodesk runs a mini-TAC for USD Maya that involves several other studios. This group determines what version of USD will be targeted for each Maya platform.

    • CoryO: Might be a good idea to have discussions in this group around USD version alignment for a broader range of DCC vendors and studios, like the Maya TAC but geared toward the wider USDWG membership, including vendors? This is probably a good topic to follow up on next session.

    • CoryO: Perhaps better for DCC vendors to provide bridge products that allow the USD libraries to be swapped out, as is done with Maya and Houdini.

      • MathieuM: Looking to integrate USD in a range of products, will look at the bridge concept.

    • Wave: Knowing which versions of USD have major important changes would be helpful to picking what version of USD to target for a particular platform at Apple.

  • Closing/Action Items (0:58-1:00)

    • Consider language changes to the charter around self-organized standards discussions in the USDWG, propose to TAC (CoryO)

    • Add a page to the WG wiki for scheduling self-organized standard scheduling (CoryO)

    • Loft the USD Cookbook from the USD Resources page up to the front page (CoryO)

Parking Lot

  • USD Superbuilds (Carson B.)

Reference

License: CC BY 4.0, Copyright Contributors to the ASWF USD working group.