<Working> Maya USD Plugin

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The Maya USD plugin (mayaUsdPlugin) enables USD workflows in Maya, including loading USD scenes via mayaUsdProxyShape for rendering with Arnold, V-Ray, or Redshift. This guide covers how to deliver it to Deadline Cloud SMF workers using Plugin Sync.

Tested Versions

Maya Version	MayaUSD Version	Arnold Version	Status
2026	0.31.0	7.4.3.1	✅ Working
2025	0.31.0	7.3.4.0	✅ Working
2024	0.31.0	7.2.5.3	✅ Working

Recommended version: MayaUSD v0.31.0 — latest version compatible with all three Maya versions on SMF.

⚠️ MayaUSD extracted from the full Maya installer (e.g. Autodesk_Maya_2025_3_ML_Linux_64bit.tgz) may not work with the current configuration. Github releases are recommended.
⚠️ v0.34.0+ for Maya 2026 uses a multi-USD directory structure that is not compatible with Plugin Sync. Use v0.31.0 for Maya 2026.

How to Install

1. Download the MayaUSD v0.31.0 Linux installer for your Maya version from GitHub Releases (https://github.com/Autodesk/maya-usd/releases/tag/v0.31.0)
2. Extract the installer:

    chmod +x MayaUSD*.run
    ./MayaUSD*.run
    # Accept the terms and conditions
    # Choose option 2: Extract package content

3. Extract the RPM:

rpm2cpio MayaUSD*.rpm | cpio -idm

4. Fix the .mod file — remove <PLUGIN_DIR>/ from paths:

   sed -i 's|<PLUGIN_DIR>/||g' $(find . -name "mayausd.mod")

5. After extracting the RPM, the three items to upload to S3 are located at:

• usr/autodesk/modules/maya/<version>/mayausd.mod
• usr/autodesk/mayausd/maya<version>/<build>/mayausd/MayaUSD/
• usr/autodesk/mayausd/maya<version>/<build>/mayausd/USD/

Where <version> is the Maya year (e.g. 2026) and <build> is the release-specific build string (e.g. 0.31.0_202501281116-97cf933).

Where to Copy to S3

Upload to your queue's job attachments bucket:

s3://<job-attachments-bucket>/<root-prefix>/plugins/linux/maya/<version>/mayausd.mod
s3://<job-attachments-bucket>/<root-prefix>/plugins/linux/maya/<version>/MayaUSD/
s3://<job-attachments-bucket>/<root-prefix>/plugins/linux/maya/<version>/USD/

Where <version> is 2024, 2025, or 2026.

You can find your bucket and root prefix on the queue details page in the Deadline Cloud console.

Scene Setup

• Add loadPlugin "mayaUsdPlugin"; to your scene (or ensure it auto-loads when the scene references USD)
• For USD assets (e.g. Kitchen_set), add the asset directory as an input folder in the submitter's Job Attachments
• Use relative file paths for USD references in your mayaUsdProxyShape

Conda Packages

In the submitter, use:

• Maya 2026: maya=2026.* maya-openjd maya-mtoa
• Maya 2025: maya=2025.* maya-openjd maya-mtoa
• Maya 2024: maya=2024.* maya-openjd maya-mtoa

Channel: deadline-cloud