01
AUTHOR LIGHT
Keep the quad-based FBX workflow you already know.
Import the source, cook the relationship once, and keep your final surface connected to the cage.
GPU SUBDIVISIONFOR UNREAL ENGINE
Animate the skeletal cage.Render the smooth surface.
Cook Catmull-Clark subdivision data from your FBX once. Drive the smooth surface from an animated Skeletal Mesh (SKM) every frame, with Static Mesh (SM) supported by the same GPU workflow.
LIVE GPU
ORIGINAL CAGE → SMOOTH SURFACE
Animated Skeletal Mesh demo captured in Unreal Engine.
5.7 / 5.8Unreal Engine
SKM + SMMesh support
GPURuntime evaluation
WIN64Current platform
THE CORE IDEA
The mesh you animate should not limit the surface you render.
A light control cage is ideal for authoring and animation. USoftSubdiv reconstructs the smooth final surface from the current pose on the GPU.
02
RENDER DENSE
Avoid exporting a permanently dense final mesh.
GPU evaluation keeps the high-resolution result live for animation, materials, motion, and shadows.
03
ITERATE FAST
Switch between every cooked level without re-cooking.
Level 0 stays the original cage. Higher pre-cooked levels are available whenever the shot needs them.
SYNCHRONIZED SKM COMPARISON
One animation. Two surface views.
Drag the divider to compare the wireframe and shaded result while the same Skeletal Mesh animation stays synchronized on the GPU.
WIREFRAME SKM
SHADED SKM
ANIMATION-FIRST RUNTIME SURFACES
Built around animated Skeletal Mesh characters.
The first release focuses on the path from a clean animated SKM cage to a dependable runtime surface, while supporting SM assets through the same workflow.
01
GPU Catmull-Clark
OpenSubdiv stencils are prepared once in the editor and evaluated with compute shaders at runtime.
02
Animated Skeletal Meshes
For Skeletal Mesh (SKM) characters, the smooth surface follows Unreal's GPU Skin Cache every frame.
03
SKM + SM workflow
Lead with animated Skeletal Mesh (SKM) characters, with Static Mesh (SM) props and environments supported by the same cook workflow.
04
Cook once, switch live
Pre-cook levels 0 through your maximum, then change the active level without cooking again.
05
Materials preserved
Material sections, UV0, normal-map tangents, and raster overlay materials stay connected.
06
Ray-traced shadows
Animated Skeletal Mesh and Static Mesh subdivided surfaces cast and receive hardware ray-traced shadows.
07
Maya Alembic caches
Cook from a Maya .abc cache and stream the animation. Material slots arrive with their Maya shading-group names, and only a small window of decoded frames stays in memory, so cache length does not change RAM.
WORKFLOW
From FBX to a live subdivided surface.
No new DCC loop. No offline validation pass. The setup lives next to the asset in Unreal.
- 01Import
Start with an animated Skeletal Mesh (SKM), or bring in a Static Mesh (SM), and keep the quad-based source FBX available. A Maya Alembic (.abc) cache can be used as the source instead.
- 02Cook Subdiv
Right-click the asset, select the maximum level, and create the reusable SubdivInfo asset.
- 03Place
Drop the asset into a scene. USoftSubdiv attaches and configures the runtime component.
- 04Animate SKM + render
Choose any cooked level. The smooth surface follows the live Skeletal Mesh pose on the GPU.
CURRENT COMPATIBILITY
Clear requirements. No mystery compatibility.
The current release is intentionally focused. Every item below reflects the verified build, not a future roadmap promise.
- Engine
- Unreal Engine 5.7 and 5.8
- Platform
- Windows 64-bit
- Primary workflow
- Animated Skeletal Mesh (SKM)
- Also supported
- Static Mesh (SM)
- Source
- Single- and multi-mesh FBX, or a Maya Alembic (.abc) cache
- Alembic cache
- Read from disk per frame, not imported as an asset
- Alembic materials
- Shading-group names via the Maya export tool
- Builds
- Editor, Development, Shipping
- Animation
- GPU Skin Cache required
- Rendering
- Hardware ray tracing optional
DOWNLOAD BUILD
Choose your Unreal Engine version.
Select the version used by your project and download the matching precompiled Win64 package.
SELECT ENGINE VERSION
Choose the same engine version used by your Unreal project.
READY TO DOWNLOADv0.3.4
USoftSubdiv for Unreal Engine 5.8
Precompiled Win64 package with Runtime and Editor modules.
Download for UE 5.8Extract the archive, then copy the USoftSubdiv folder into YourProject/Plugins.
SHA-256 checksum
4489DE8508E3B9642671274C249D1A561F4572175489687B4794CB04FA783CD6FREE TOOLS
Free tools and plugins. No licence, no purchase.
Everything below is free and stands on its own: none of it needs a USoftSubdiv licence, and none of it needs the paid plugin installed. Grouped by the application it runs in, because that is what decides how you install it.
Unreal Engine
USoft Mesh Transformv0.1.1
Bakes a static mesh actor's rotation and scale into the mesh with Ctrl+Shift+B, and moves its pivot to any point on the bounding box with Ctrl+Numpad — without entering Modeling Mode. Nothing to do with subdivision: it is a level-editing tool that stands entirely on its own.
Extract the archive into your project's Plugins/ folder and restart the editor — the plugin is enabled by default, and the shortcuts work straight away.
Maya
USoftSubdiv Maya Exporterv0.3.2
Tags each Maya mesh with its shading-group name and exports the Alembic cache USoftSubdiv reads back in Unreal, so material slots survive the trip. Useful together with the Unreal plugin.
Download Maya Exporter (ZIP)Reference Finderv0.1.0
A scene that comes back from another machine opens with every rig reference broken, Maya asking for each file by hand. Point this at one folder and it finds and repaths them in one pass. Works on its own — no Unreal, no licence, nothing to do with subdivision.
Download Reference Finder (ZIP)Each Maya tool is a separate download, and each installs the same way: extract the archive anywhere and drag install.py into the Maya viewport — its shelf button appears.
LICENSING
Start free. Upgrade for unlimited cooks.
Register with your email for a free 5-cook Trial key, or purchase a separate 1-Month License key for unlimited cooks during 30 days.
TRIALEmail registration · no payment
Free5 cooks total
EMAIL → FREE KEY → ACTIVATE → 5 COOKS
- Register with your email
- Receive a free Trial activation key
- 5 cook authorizations total
- One machine per key
- Internet required for each cook
1-MONTH LICENSEPaid production access
30 daysprice shown at checkout
EMAIL → PAYMENT → PAID KEY → 30 DAYS
- Register with your checkout email
- Receive a separate paid activation key
- Unlimited cooks for 30 days
- One machine per key
- Renew for another 30-day period
FAQ
Technical answers before you install.
The short version: current packages target Win64 on Unreal Engine 5.7 and 5.8, using a quad-based FBX as the cook source.
What is USoftSubdiv?
USoftSubdiv is an OpenSubdiv-powered GPU subdivision plugin for Unreal Engine. It cooks Catmull-Clark data in the editor and evaluates the selected smooth surface at runtime.
Which mesh types are supported?
Skeletal Meshes (SKM) and Static Meshes (SM) are supported, including FBX files containing multiple mesh nodes. The primary workflow is animated SKM characters.
Is a source file required?
Yes, and it must stay reachable. Skeletal and Static Mesh cooks read the quad-based FBX cage; the imported path is detected automatically, or selected manually if the file moved. The Alembic workflow reads a Maya .abc cache instead.
Can I use a Maya Alembic cache?
Yes. A .abc cache can drive the subdivision cage directly. It is not imported as an Unreal asset: the file stays on disk and the cage points are read from it each frame, so the cache has to travel with the project.
Does a long Alembic cache increase memory use?
No. Decoded cage frames are kept in a small LRU window (r.OpenSubdivUE.Alembic.CacheFrames, 8 by default), so streaming memory follows the cage size, not the cache length: a 100-frame and a 10 000-frame cache cost the same. Cooked subdivision levels are a separate budget.
Do materials survive the Alembic export?
Yes, when the cache is exported with the Maya tool. It writes each mesh's shading-group name into the cache, so Unreal opens one material slot per shading group, named as in Maya. Without it Maya only records per-face assignments — a material assigned to a whole object never reaches the .abc at all — and every mesh becomes its own slot.
How do I export an Alembic cache from Maya?
The plugin ships the Maya tools in MayaContent/usoftsubdiv, and they are also a separate free download for artists who do not install Unreal themselves. Copy that folder — including its icons — into your Maya scripts directory, then run 'import usoftsubdiv.shelf_install' followed by 'usoftsubdiv.shelf_install.install()' in the Script Editor's PYTHON tab, not the MEL tab. A '# Result: True #' line confirms it worked, and a USoftSubdiv shelf tab appears. Select your meshes, press the button, set the file path and frame range, and export.
Where should the .abc file live?
Inside the project, next to it in AlembicSource/. Then the path is stored relative to the project, the cache survives moving the project to another machine, and migrating the asset carries the cache with it.
Does it support animation?
Yes. Animated Skeletal Mesh (SKM) is a core workflow: subdivision reads the animated cage from Unreal's GPU Skin Cache every frame and keeps the smooth surface in sync.
Must I re-cook when changing levels?
No. You can switch instantly between every level included in the original cook. Only a level above the cooked maximum requires a new cook.
Are materials and ray tracing supported?
USoftSubdiv supports material sections, UV0, normal-map tangents, raster overlay materials, and verified hardware ray-traced shadows.
Does licensing require internet access?
Activation and periodic editor validation require a connection. Trial cooking also requires a connection for every cook authorization.
How do Trial and 1-Month license keys differ?
Registering with an email gives you a free Trial key with 5 cooks total. A paid 1-Month License uses a separate activation key with unlimited cooks for 30 days.
NEXT STEP
Keep the cage. Ship the surface.
Register with your email for a free 5-cook Trial key, or buy 30 days of unlimited cooks with a separate activation key.
SUPPORT
Stuck on something? Come and ask.
The plugin is an early access build and the fastest fixes have all started with someone describing what they hit.