Editor’s note: This post is part of Into the Omniverse, a series focused on how artists and developers from startups to enterprises can transform their workflows using the latest advances in OpenUSD and NVIDIA Omniverse.
Real-time rendering, animation and texture baking are essential workflows for 3D art production. Using the Marmoset Toolbag software, 3D artists can enhance their creative workflows and build complex 3D models without disruptions to productivity.
The latest release of Marmoset Toolbag, version 4.06, brings increased support for Universal Scene Description, aka OpenUSD, enabling seamless compatibility with NVIDIA Omniverse, a development platform for connecting and building OpenUSD-based tools and applications.
3D creators and technical artists using Marmoset can now enjoy improved interoperability, accelerated rendering, real-time visualization and efficient performance — redefining the possibilities of their creative workflows.
Enhancing Cross-Platform Creativity With OpenUSD
Creators are taking their workflows to the next level with OpenUSD.
Berlin-based Armin Halač works as a principal animator at Wooga, a mobile games development studio known for projects like June’s Journey and Ghost Detective. The nature of his job means Halač is no stranger to 3D workflows — he gets hands-on with animation and character rigging.
For texturing and producing high-quality renders, Marmoset is Halač’s go-to tool, providing a user-friendly interface and powerful features to simplify his workflow. Recently, Halač used Marmoset to create the captivating cover image for his book, A Complete Guide to Character Rigging for Games Using Blender.
Using the added support for USD, Halač can seamlessly send 3D assets from Blender to Marmoset, creating new possibilities for collaboration and improved visuals.
The cover image of Halač’s book.
Nkoro Anselem Ire, a.k.a askNK, is a popular YouTube creator as well as a media and visual arts professor at a couple of universities who is also seeing workflow benefits from increased USD support.
As a 3D content creator, he uses Marmoset Toolbag for the majority of his PBR workflow — from texture baking and lighting to animation and rendering. Now, with USD, askNK is enjoying newfound levels of creative flexibility as the framework allows him to “collaborate with individuals or team members a lot easier because they can now pick up and drop off processes while working on the same file.”
Halač and askNK recently joined an NVIDIA-hosted livestream where community members and the Omniverse team explored the benefits of a Marmoset- and Omniverse-boosted workflow.
Daniel Bauer is another creator experiencing the benefits of Marmoset, OpenUSD and Omniverse. A SolidWorks mechanical engineer with over 10 years of experience, Bauer works frequently in CAD software environments, where it’s typical to assign different materials to various scene components. The variance can often lead to shading errors and incorrect geometry representation, but using USD, Bauer can avoid errors by easily importing versions of his scene from Blender to Marmoset Toolbag to Omniverse USD Composer.
A Kuka Scara robot simulation with 10 parallel small grippers for sorting and handling pens.
Additionally, 3D artists Gianluca Squillace and Pasquale Scionti are harnessing the collaborative power of Omniverse, Marmoset and OpenUSD to transform their workflows from a convoluted series of exports and imports to a streamlined, real-time, interconnected process.
Squillace crafted a captivating 3D character with Pixologic ZBrush, Autodesk Maya, Adobe Substance 3D Painter and Marmoset Toolbag — aggregating the data from the various tools in Omniverse. With USD, he seamlessly integrated his animations and made real-time adjustments without the need for constant file exports.
Simultaneously, Scionti constructed a stunning glacial environment using Autodesk 3ds Max, Adobe Substance 3D Painter, Quixel and Unreal Engine, uniting the various pieces from his tools in Omniverse. His work showcased the potential of Omniverse to foster real-time collaboration as he was able to seamlessly integrate Squillace’s character into his snowy world.
Advancing Interoperability and Real-Time Rendering
Marmoset Toolbag 4.06 provides significant improvements to interoperability and image fidelity for artists working across platforms and applications. This is achieved through updates to Marmoset’s OpenUSD support, allowing for seamless compatibility and connection with the Omniverse ecosystem.
The improved USD import and export capabilities enhance interoperability with popular content creation apps and creative toolkits like Autodesk Maya and Autodesk 3ds Max, SideFX Houdini and Unreal Engine.
Additionally, Marmoset Toolbag 4.06 brings additional updates, including:
- RTX-accelerated rendering and baking: Toolbag’s ray-traced renderer and texture baker are accelerated by NVIDIA RTX GPUs, providing up to a 2x improvement in render times and a 4x improvement in bake times.
- Real-time denoising with OptiX: With NVIDIA RTX devices, creators can enjoy a smooth and interactive ray-tracing experience, enabling real-time navigation of the active viewport without visual artifacts or performance disruptions.
- High DPI performance with DLSS image upscaling: The viewport now renders at a reduced resolution and uses AI-based technology to upscale images, improving performance while minimizing image-quality reductions.
Download Toolbag 4.06 directly from Marmoset to explore USD support and RTX-accelerated production tools. New users are eligible for a full-featured, 30-day free trial license.
Get Plugged Into the Omniverse
Learn from industry experts on how OpenUSD is enabling custom 3D pipelines, easing 3D tool development and delivering interoperability between 3D applications in sessions from SIGGRAPH 2023, now available on demand.
Anyone can build their own Omniverse extension or Connector to enhance their 3D workflows and tools. Explore the Omniverse ecosystem’s growing catalog of connections, extensions, foundation applications and third-party tools.
For more resources on OpenUSD, explore the Alliance for OpenUSD forum or visit the AOUSD website.
Share your Marmoset Toolbag and Omniverse work as part of the latest community challenge, #SeasonalArtChallenge. Use the hashtag to submit a spooky or festive scene for a chance to be featured on the @NVIDIAStudio and @NVIDIAOmniverse social channels.
Show us your spookiest 3D scenes in the new #SeasonalArtChallenge.
Get in the spooky spirit and share your scenes with us and @NVIDIAStudio for a chance to be featured on our channels.
🎃 courtesy of @TanjaLanggner
— NVIDIA Omniverse (@nvidiaomniverse) October 10, 2023
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Featured image courtesy of Armin Halač, Christian Nauck and Masuquddin Ahmed.