Heading toward a standard VFX pipeline - MaterialX

So as I discussed earlier open-source solutions in the VFX/CGI industry have huge impact. We can think of the OpenEXR or the Alembic formats for example.

Pixar's USD was a new level of the open sourced technologies beacause basically we can adopt a high profile pipeline solution originally developed one of the biggest 3D animation studio of the Globe.

MaterialX could be another milestone of the VFX/CGI industry however it is not clear for me how it will evolve. Quote from their description:
"MaterialX provides a schema for describing material networks, shader parameters, texture and material assignments, and color-space associations in a precise, application-independent, and customizable way."

If we look at USD in production viewpoint it is rather a tool for the 3D layout (whatever it means) and of course it is in connection with modelling, animation, fx. So it basically deals with geometries (maybe volumes as well) in a software agnostic way.

But MaterialX propesed to be a standard for look-development data transfer. So it should mean 2D (like textures) and 3D (materials/shaders) type of data in render engine agnostic way. If we think about in a long term it could means every rendering soultion would understand MaterialX data...we will see.

MaterialX was used on the feature film Star Wars Rogue one for example.