Stage open with population mask

[jcoelho88]

Hello, I was wondering if there is a way to open a stage in Maya with a population mask.

Right now I can't seem to see how one would do it.

I should clarify that this is not just for stage display as the "mayaUsdProxyShape" allows for solo/exclusive prim paths to be taken into account for display on the viewport, this is not what I'm looking for (unless I'm wrong on how that feature works). I'm looking for a way to reduce the load/overhead of the stage.

I know I can set the population mask after the "mayaUsdProxyShape" node is created and pointing to the layer I want to mask but I was hoping to be able to do it before I take the hit to load time.

Example via the pxr API:

shot_stage = Usd.Stage.OpenMasked(shot_layer_path, population_mask)

I thought maybe if I opened the layer via the pxr API and then creating the "mayaUsdProxyShape" node to point to the same layer it would work but no luck.

For anyone interested in how it was tested:

from pxr import Usd, Sdf

test_shot_path = "/PATH/TO/LAYER/shot.usda"

test_prim_list = ["/world/prp/prp_bench01t_0001", "/world/prp/prp_axe_0001", "/world/prp/prp_accordion_0001", "/world/chr/chr_jon_0001"]

population_mask = Usd.StagePopulationMask()

# Add each test prim to the population mask
for prim in test_prim_list:
    population_mask.Add(Sdf.Path(prim))

# Open shot with mask
shot_stage = Usd.Stage.OpenMasked(test_shot_path, population_mask)

# Create the "mayaUsdProxyShape" and point it to the root layer of the stage with the mask
maya_stage_node = cmds.createNode('mayaUsdProxyShape', name='shot_{0}_{1}Shape'.format("000992", "0010"), skipSelect=True)
cmds.connectAttr('time1.outTime', 'shot_{0}_{1}.time'.format("000992", "0010"))
cmds.setAttr('{0}.filePath'.format(maya_stage_node), shot_stage.GetRootLayer().identifier, type='string')

The goal is to provide an artist more granular control on what they are going to load into their scene on top of using things like payloads.

Masks are great and if I simply apply it after the stage is loaded via the "mayaUsdProxyShape" it will work but we've already had to take the loss in load time.

If this is not currently possible I'm happy to make an issue adding the feature.

Cheers,

Jason Coelho