Blender add-on mimics the PxrDisney shader in Cycles

Originally posted on 10 June 2016. Scroll down for news of the commercial release.

Motion graphics firm Onelvxe Studios has released a free beta of a Blender node setup emulating the popular PxrDisney BRDF shader used in RenderMan within Blender’s native Cycles renderer.

So what is the PxrDisney shader?
An ‘ubershader’ designed for flexibility in production, PxrDisney is intended to enable artists to create a wide range of realistic-looking materials, including metals, plastics and translucent objects.

It’s a ‘principled’, rather than strictly physically accurate, shader and is focused on speed and ease of use.

A group of developers spearheaded by Pascal Schön is currently working on implementing the shader directly within Blender, although at time of posting, it’s still an ongoing project.

Free beta-add on mimics PxrDisney within Cycles
In the mean time, Onelvxe’s third-party implementation “uses many of the same principles as the Disney shader and implements some PBR Workflows to push realism within Cycles”.

The studio describes the set-up as being able to “craft nearly any material imaginable including non-metals (dielectrics), metals with anisotropy, car paint, glass, skin (SSS), [emissive] and nature-type materials”.

While the implementation will eventually form part of a “much larger” commercial Cycles add-on, the beta is free, so anyone registering on the Onelvxe website can download the .blend file.

Updated 19 July 2016: Onelvxe has released the ubershader, now officially named the Onelvxe Studio Shader, as part of new commercial products.

The Onelvxe Material Pipeline bundle consists of the shader itself, a texture-import plugin, and a library of 100 readymade PBR materials, some of which can be seen in the image above. It costs $49.99

The Variety Pack consists of just the shader, the texture plugin and 10 readymade materials; and costs $23.50, while additional packs of readymade materials cost $8.50 for 10.

In addition, the original beta of the shader remains free to download, and is available via the link below.

Read more about the new commercial shader products on Onelvxe Studios’ website

Download the beta version of the Disney ubershader from Onelvxe Studios’ website

Visit the feedback thread for the shader on Blenderartists.org