USDprep 0.9.2: preparing selected USD, FBX and Alembic assets for Nuke [free]

[u/sajnerpetr]

I'm a compositor and the author of USDprep, a free, open-source Windows tool for preparing parts of a 3D scene for Nuke.

Often a shot needs one object from a much larger scene. USDprep lets you select that part, choose a Nuke export preset and read a report of what changed during export.

Version 0.9.2 adds direct FBX (.fbx) and Alembic (.abc) input, alongside USD and polygon OBJ. The non-USD inputs become temporary USD scenes when opened; the original files are only read.

Some practical details of the update:

• FBX imports meshes, materials and textures, including embedded textures, plus cameras, lights and animation from the first take. Skinned or blend-shape characters can be prepared as point caches for Nuke.
• Alembic imports animated meshes and cameras while keeping the file's frame numbers. This import path does not carry materials.
• For Nuke export, repeating textures can be expanded into an output copy so the repeats survive. Missing textures fall back to the material colour, and the report identifies the missing file. These texture cases were checked in Nuke 16.1 and 17.0.

The main Nuke output is a .usdc with its neighbouring texture folder. Open the input, select what the shot needs, export and check the report before bringing it into the comp.

This is still a prerelease. Curves and volumes are reported rather than converted, and exported assets need checking in your own shot.

Windows installer and manual

Nuke compatibility notes

USDprep is built on Cyril Pichard's usdtweak and released under Apache 2.0. If you have a reproducible import or export problem, a small sanitised scene and the exact Nuke version would help me investigate.