[X3D-Ecosystem] Maya, OpenUSD, Material X, and X3D

[John Carlson]

I fully support you in your work on getting shaders more a part of the X3D
ecosystem.  I hope you are successful at targeting multiple browsers.  I
have not found shaders a portable thing between X3D browsers.

Let me know how you want support, as this has  been a long term goal.

Go, Aaron, go!

John


On Wed, Feb 18, 2026 at 12:42 AM Bergstrom, Aaron via X3D-Ecosystem <
x3d-ecosystem at web3d.org> wrote:

> All,
>
>
>
> I went off on a tangent today after attending the AOUSD web working group,
> when I realized that it’s probably possible for RawKee to fully support
> MaterialX shading/material export to X3D.
>
>
>
> Maya 2026 has something called the LookdevX Graph Editor (I think it’s
> actually been in Maya since Maya 2024).
>
>
>
> This is essentially a new shading network editor designed by Autodesk to
> eventually replace the Hypershade editor, and their new preferred method
> setting up high quality shading networks for meshes/models in Maya so that
> it can fully support OpenUSD and Material X in the future.
>
>
>
> Based on what I’ve been reviewing today, I fully expect Maya artists to
> migrate away from the old way of setting up Materials, and move fully
> toward LookdevX/MaterialX methods of shading their models in the future.
>
>
>
> Material X is primarily a portable XML schema for defining the inputs to
> shading languages. There are converters/loaders (whatever you want to call
> them) for every shading language.
>
>
>
> The intent is that you write out your shader using Material X, and
> whatever shader language and renderer that you are using, your shading
> network should render the same.
>
>
>
> However, Material X is not just an XML schema, it’s an ecosystem that
> includes a bunch of python libraries, and those libraries are now packaged
> with Maya 2026.
>
>
>
> A Maya content developer can create complex shading networks using the
> LookdevX Graph Editor, and then export them as GLSL (or any of your other
> favorite shading languages) using these MaterialX python libraries.
>
>
>
> The process is actually quite simple.
>
>
>
> As such, in addition to the robust PhysicalMaterial support that I’ve been
> working on lately, it appears that it really should be no problem to export
> complex shading networks from Maya as X3D ComposedShader nodes using the
> MaterialX methodology.
>
>
>
> This will take some additional work to implement, but I think it’ll
> definitely be worth it, and something to show off at Siggraph this year.
>
>
>
> Aaron
> --
> X3D-Ecosystem mailing list
> X3D-Ecosystem at web3d.org
> http://web3d.org/mailman/listinfo/x3d-ecosystem_web3d.org
>
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