See Nvidia’s new Omniverse plugins, apps and pricing
New app Omniverse Showroom provides access to Nvidia’s technology demos within Omniverse, its real-time collaboration platform. See Omniverse’s other new features and commercial pricing in the story below.
Nvidia has announced new plugins, new features and new pricing for Omniverse, its real-time collaboration platform, at its GTC 2021 technology conference.
New plugins include connectors for 3D city generator CityEngine, lighting design tool HDR Light Studio, and markerless motion-capture software Radical Live.
New features include Omniverse Farm, a new app for setting up distributed rendering and simulation; and Omniverse Showroom, a built-in showcase for Nvidia’s tech demos.
The firm has also officially launched Omniverse Enterprise, its commercial subscriptions to Omniverse for “businesses of any size”, with prices starting at $9,000/year.
A USD-based collaboration platform for VFX, game development, design and visualization
First announced at GTC 2020, and currently available free in open beta, Omniverse enables artists and designers anywhere in the world to collaborate on projects in real time.
The set of cloud-enabled apps enable users to see changes made to shared 3D assets by other artists, working in other software, in a livestreamed photorealistic real-time view.
Data is exchanged between compatible CAD and DCC applications and Omniverse in USD format, with connector plugins available for tools including 3ds Max, Maya, Revit, Rhino, SketchUp and Unreal Engine 4.
Omniverse itself has a modular structure, with components including Nucleus, its server-side services, Kit, its framework for viewing and editing scenes, and Connect, which connects the software to other DCC tools.
The platform comes with its own photorealistic render engine, RTX Renderer, which taps into the hardware-accelerated ray tracing capabilities of Nvidia’s current-generation RTX GPUs.
As well as the Omniverse core, Nvidia has released frontend applications for specific tasks, including Omniverse Create for scene layout and editing, and Omniverse View for scene review.
New connector plugins for CityEngine, HDR Light Studio and Radical Live available now
New Omniverse connector plugins available now include CityEngine, Esri’s 3D city generation software, HDR Light Studio, Lightmap’s lighting design tool, and AI-based markerless mocap app Radical Live.
Connectors announced for e-on software applications, Golaem, iClone and Notch
Nvidia’s blog post about the update also namechecks DAZ 3D, iClone, e-on software’s digital nature tools PlantFactory, PlantCatalog and Vue, and digital fashion and fabric platforms Style3D and Twinbru.
As far as we can tell, none of the corresponding connector plugins is publicly available yet, but e-on software is previewing its new technology at GTC.
In addition, new development partners announced by Nvidia at the conference include Wacom, Maya crowd simulation tools developer Golaem, and real-time 3D software specialist Notch.
All are described as “building support for Universal Scene Description … as a first step to connecting to Omniverse”, so there’s currently no detail on when, or whether, a connector plugin will be released.
They join other DCC applications for which connectors have been announced, but for which there is no definite release date, including Blender, Cinema 4D, Houdini, MotionBuilder and Substance materials.
New Omniverse apps for distributing GPU compute tasks and viewing tech demos
New Omniverse apps now available in beta include Omniverse Farm for setting up tasks to run in the background, automating tasks, and distributing renders or simulations across multiple machines.
Non-technical users get Omniverse Showroom, shown at the top of this story, which is essentially just a showcase for Nvidia’s tech demos, several of which are now available through Omniverse.
In addition, Nvidia has integrated CloudXR, its SDK for streaming AR, VR and mixed reality content from OpenVR-compatible software, into Omniverse Kit.
Streaming of AR content to Android and iOS devices is available in beta; VR streaming is “coming soon”.
New commercial pricing for Omniverse Enterprise subscriptions
Finally, Omniverse is now a commercial product with the launch of Omniverse Enterprise, Nvidia’s new paid subscriptions for “businesses of any size”.
Announced earlier this year, and originally due to roll out in the summer, paid subscriptions enable more than two people to collaborate via Omniverse, and include active product support.
Pricing has changed since the original announcement, and now has three separate components.
Omniverse Enterprise Creator subscriptions provide access to the full feature set, while Omniverse Enterprise Reviewer subscriptions are intended for making comments and “minor edits” to shared scenes.
Omniverse Enterprise Nucleus subscriptions provide access to the shared Nucleus server.
Creator subscriptions cost $2,000/year and Reviewer subscriptions cost $100/year, both as floating licences; and Nucleus subscriptions cost $1,000/year per named user.
There are minimum initial purchases for all three, which means that the total cost of Omniverse Enterprise starts at $9,000/year for two creators and 10 reviewers.
The Omniverse beta remains free to individual artists, who can use it to collaborate with one other person.
Availability and system requirements
Omniverse is available for Windows 10 and CentOS 7/Ubuntu 18.04 Linux. It requires a current-gen Nvidia RTX GPU. You can find system requirements for the integration plugins here.
Omniverse apps and some of the connector plugins can be installed from the same installer as Omniverse.
Ominverse Enterprise subscriptions are available through Nvidia’s partner firms, including BOXX Technologies, Dell, HP, Lenovo and Supermicro, at the prices listed above.
Read Nvidia’s blog post announcing the latest changes to Omniverse