USD (OpenUSD)
Scene description format for pipelines
Also known as: OpenUSD · Universal Scene Description · .usd · .usdz · USDZ
Definition
USD, Universal Scene Description, is an open-source scene description format developed at Pixar and now known as OpenUSD. It describes whole scenes rather than single models, with layers and references that let many artists work on the same shot or level without overwriting each other's work. USD is standard in film and animation and is spreading into game and real-time pipelines through tools such as Houdini, Maya and Blender and engine integrations such as Unreal's USD support.
In production
For game art you will mostly meet USD as an interchange format for scenes and as USDZ for Apple AR. Its layering suits large teams, but the tooling is more complex than FBX or glTF, so check what your tools support. If a studio asks for USD, treat the file as a scene made of references, not a single mesh, and follow its naming and layer structure.
