Render USD scenes with Houdini Husk on Deadline Cloud

The houdini_husk_usd_render job bundle renders a USD scene using the Houdini husk CLI. By default, Husk renders with the Houdini Karma renderer, but Husk supports any Hydra-compatible USD render delegate. The bundle expands to a task per frame using the Frames job parameter and limits execution to Linux workers through host requirements.

To render with the KarmaXPU GPU engine, uncomment the amount.worker.gpu host requirement in the job template so that the job is scheduled on a worker with a GPU. The Karma renderer requires a Karma license to run. Service-managed fleets provide usage-based Karma licenses automatically.

This bundle also shows how to write a custom asset introspection tool for job attachments. The included generate_usd_job.py script inspects a USD file, finds all referenced asset files, and generates a job bundle with job attachment references for those assets. To use the script, install the usd-core and deadline Python libraries and run:

python3 generate_usd_job.py my_scene.usd

The bundle also supports V-Ray and Redshift renderers through their Hydra render delegates. To use these renderers, build a conda package with the houdini-vray-7, houdini-redshift-2025, or houdini-redshift-2026 conda recipes.

The bundle includes a sample.usda file with a cube and sphere that has no external dependencies and can be rendered without attaching any other files.