Adobe releases Substance 3D Painter 11.1
Adobe has released Substance 3D Painter 11.1, the latest version of the 3D texture painting software for games, animation, motion graphics and VFX.
The update adds a new Ribbon path for repeating patterns along strips across the surface of a 3D object, and extends symmetry for fill layers and effects to their 3D projection modes.
Windows and Linux users get a new Vulkan backend for viewport rendering and texture baking.
New Ribbon path tiles or stretches patterns across the surface of a 3D model
The main new feature in Substance 3D Painter 11.1 is the Ribbon path, the latest edition to the family of 3D path tools introduced in Substance 3D Painter 9.0.
Unlike the existing Paint along path tool, which simply repeats an image along a 3D path across the surface of a model, the Ribbon path deforms the image to follow the curves of the path.
That opens up new workflows, like being able to flow text or a color gradient along the ribbon.
Users can choose different corner shapes where the path turns, and different blend modes for the alpha, normal and height channels where it passes over itself.
Like other path types, the Ribbon path is compatible with Painter’s symmetry system, and with dynamic strokes, which change brush stamp properties along the length of a stroke.
The update also adds 75 new tool presets that make use of the Ribbon path, including cracks, welds and tape, and clothing effects like seams, zippers and fabric tears.
Updates to existing features
The existing path tools have also been updated, and now support per-vertex size and opacity.
It is also now possible to enable symmetry – both radial and mirror symmetry – when using 3D projection modes in fill layers and effects. Mirrored text can be flipped to make it readable.
In addition, users can set the scale of displacement effects using physical units, making it easier to match displaced geometry with other DCC applications.
There are also a few smaller feature and performance updates, listed in the release notes.
Now uses Vulkan for viewport rendering and texture baking on Windows and Linux
In addition, Substance 3D Painter becomes the latest DCC application to switch from the ageing OpenGL graphics API to Vulkan in its rendering backend.
Vulkan is now used on Windows and Linux for viewport rendering and computing textures.
In addition, Vulkan is now used for GPU ray tracing for texture baking, instead of DXR and OptiX, making GPU ray tracing available on AMD GPUs, and on Linux.
Price and system requirements
Substance 3D Painter 11.0 is available for Windows 11, RHEL 8.6/9.2+ and Ubuntu 22.04+ Linux and macOS 12.0+.
Perpetual licences are available via Steam and cost $199.99.
The software is also available via Adobe’s Creative Cloud-based Substance 3D subscriptions.
Substance 3D Texturing subscriptions now cost $24.99/month or $249.99/year; Substance 3D Collection subscriptions now cost $59.99/month or $599.99/year.
Read a list of new features in Substance 3D Painter 11.1 in the online release notes
Have your say on this story by following CG Channel on Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter). As well as being able to comment on stories, followers of our social media accounts can see videos we don’t post on the site itself, including making-ofs for the latest VFX movies, animations, games cinematics and motion graphics projects.