I am interested in OpenUSD for portability of content. Instead of being tied to one rendering engine, my content can be rendered in multiple tools. At least that is the OpenUSD promise. But there are practical issues, one of which is materials. How to create materials that work across multiple tools? One project that gets … More OpenUSD UsdPreviewSurface Material Portability
Want to add a bit more “life” to your video voiceovers, but don’t want to show your own face? How about using a 3D avatar, synced with your facial movements? When to use an Avatar? Are avatars always the best option? No! If you are your brand (say, you are an individual business coach) then … More Animated Voiceovers
I sometimes listen in on the Academy Software Foundation (https://www.aswf.io/) sessions. The latest Web OpenUSD online meeting had a presentation by CloudZeta, OpenUSD for 3D Cloud – Content Distribution & Collaboration. 3D assets are large, so having a shared online storage area that 3D creators and consumers can share with web based preview would be … More CloudZeta – GitHub for 3D Assets
In my last post I introduced the approach of using Google MediaPipe to control VRM character facial expressions. Hasn’t this been done before? Yes! There are some excellent projects around, including XR Animator. But there is nothing like firsthand experience. In this blog post I describe my efforts to use TensorFlow.js to train a machine … More TensorFlow.js in the browser for expression prediction
I am working on a web based 3D animation project where you can create an animated video using 3D character models, like a cut scene in a video game. Facial expressions in 3D are frequently animated using “blend shapes” (aka “morphs”, “shape keys”, or “facial landmarks”). Google MediaPipe can be used to live capture a … More Getting Google MediaPipe to control VRM Characters
Generative AI can be great for background images in animated videos. Want a single shot walking along a path? Creating a background image can take some time to assemble, so generative AI for creating 2D images with Stable Diffusion, Midjourney, DALL-E, etc. can be a real time saver. The following image was created using the … More Generative AI for 3D Scene Backgrounds
I am working on a project where I want to manipulate Skeletal Animation clips (for 3D computer animation) in JavaScript, then export to USD. Depressingly it’s not that hard. Why depressingly? Because I spent a LONG time working out what turns out to be pretty simple code. Luckily I am not BITTER about that at … More Retargeting Skeletal Animation to USD
TL;DR: In this post I explore the pros and cons of using OpenUSD directly in web applications. What is OpenUSD? “Developed by Pixar, Universal Scene Description (USD) is the first open-source software that can robustly and scalably interchange 3D scenes that may be composed of many different assets, sources, and animations, while fostering highly collaborative … More OpenUSD on the Web – October ’23 Musings
I have been exploring NVIDIA Omniverse and the standard it is built on, OpenUSD (aka USD). It provides a number of ways to animate objects in a 3D scene. My personal interest in animation is I am trying to build a tool to simplify assembling your own animated video where the final result is exported … More Options for representing Animation in OpenUSD
I am trying to work out how to do various cinematic effects in Omniverse. This post is one step on that journey, particularly for “God Rays” (sunbeams) through the clouds. Here is an extreme example (generated by DALL-E) of the sort of effect I am after. The challenge I have had is to get the … More Sunbeams via Fog in Omniverse
Extra Ordinary, the Series 