I have heard a lot about the USD file format and have become fascinated.
I would like to hear your input on the following questions:
They’re just two attempts at the same thing.
FBX has been imported by UE for a lot longer than USD.
Looks like you don’t know what you’re talking about. There’s a lot of that here.
I think FBX will be still more suited way of transferring individual assets such as static and skeletal meshes, where as USD is a format to transfer entire scenes/levels.
Interesting. As far as I can tell, UE4 has imported FBX since 2014, where USD is still in beta…
UDK supports fbx too, so if you count that it goes back even further.
Which is better red or blue?
Depends on context which is true for all things digitally created.
USD is a Pixar thing that’s been developed to meet their needs and demands so it may or may not fit your needs. The number one issue facing content development these days is the need to maintain fidelity of asset from one plat form to another with in the production pipeline.
Depending on the application preference of Pixar USD is probably designed to move DCC assets between applications with zero loss as to things like animations, cameras, lights materials and shader construction which can and usually is lost to the pipeline as the packaging does not understand the asset requirements from one application from another. There is just not one spec to rule them all Ideal what looks good ov3er there should look good over here.
FBX on the other hand is more utility in it’s construction and scales well as to the needs of the “general use” pipeline as it’s left up to the software developer to extract the data from the FBX package with in a structure that fits their design pathway.
Daz Studio for example has recently introduced a FBX bridge that does a very good job maintaining the fidelity of the material assets as to what is skin and what is metal that continues to improve with each new release.
It’s also the mechanism thats use to make things like Live Update work. Lot’s still top be side but with out writing a book FBX is the first true utility format that started out as the native save format for MotionBuider (AKA Filmbox)
To be fair, OP asked specific questions about USD vs FBX, and not “which one is better”.
Well it’s difficult to compare features as it would be like comparing a hammer to a winch with out context as a starting point of comparison .
To be fair one would need to know how USD is used with in an active development pipeline such used by Pixar which is secrete sauce verse FBX which today is supported by most if not all 3d applications.
To be fair I’ve been using FBX since Kaydra made it open license and have little excperienc of how USD would function with in a development pipeline but since most if not all 3d apps make it available it makes my pipeline easier to handle.