Fill Layer in Paint Room

[Malo]

Hi at all.

After several testings with the new PBR Materials, i feel something wents wrong if you have to change some colors, roughness and metalness on your existing models.
In Substance Painter there is an easy way to do that job. It is called Fill Layer.

 

I have created a little Video about the Problems and how it works in Substance Painter.

Problems:

100% Roughness and Metallness
In 3d Coat you have always to work with 100% Roughness and Metalness, if you want be able to change these values on the fly.
That means, if you fill your object with 50% Roughness, you where not be able to go above 50% in the layer.
If you need 75% or 100% you have to fill the complede layer new. Same with Metalness.
 

HUE, Saturation and Brighness
The next big problem is the color change. Hue, Saturation and Brighness did not realy work in realtime.
On the other side there is no Color palette or something like that, it is always trial and error to find the correct color.

Tiling
If you want to change the tiling of your Material, you have to delete the layer befor,

because 3d coat where not be able to delete the old material and replace it with a new one.
If you dont delete it, you have both tilings, old and new, in your current layer.
 

 

Solution

Fill Layer
In Substance Painter there is an option for it, it is called Fill Layer.
This layer stores the material infos and let you modifiy it on the fly in a non destructive way.
You are not be able to paint on it, because it is only for the used material itself.
Something similar would be nice for 3d Coat.

Long story short

Feel free to add you +1 here if you think a Fill Layer would be a good idea.

Mantis

http://3d-coat.com/mantis/view.php?id=1736

Trello

https://trello.com/c/ghjYS3DG/312-fill-layer-for-paint-room

 

Cheers Malo

Edited January 25, 2015 by Malo

[Mighty Pea]

If Andrew implements Substances, everything that's possible in Substance Painter will become possible here as well. And you can download substances that others have created, you don't need Substance Designer to make your own (although it's regularly being sold for cheap, and it's great software).

It's at the absolute top of the Trello roadmap, so I hope it happens soon!

 

Having said that, though, I think fill layers that are compatible with Photoshop's colour fill layers would be fantastic, especially if Photoshop-like masking is implemented as well.

Edited January 25, 2015 by Mighty Pea

[Malo]

If we could use Substances, that would be awesome, but then have Andrew much more work as with the Fill Layers.

You know, there are more options in a Substance as i suggest with a Fill Layer.

 

Anyway

I have the complede package, Designer, Painter and Bitmap2Material.

It makes not a big difference for me, I could create my own Substances.

Edited January 25, 2015 by Malo

[AbnRanger]

I agree with the request. Basically like having a SOLID layer in Photoshop. It allows you to quickly make color adjustments right in the layer panel area. But, this brings me to another request and one I think is going to continue to get bumped back further and further and further and further, with all of these non-stop requests. That is performance in the Paint Room. I have shown Andrew how slow and unusable the sliders are in the Paint room....including the Adjustment panels. He agreed and said "I will do it after...." But then all these new..."Make it like Substance Painter" requests keep popping up.

 

I'm afraid we are NEVER, EVER going to see him stop and do the necessary work to optimize the performance in the Paint Room. Beginning with the sliders, but also hiding/unhiding layers, and painting with large brush radius' All these new requests keep all the old, and much needed ones from ever seeing the light of day.

[AbnRanger]

And it gets annoying to see them jump in line ahead of requests that have been made for years, now.....and never gotten the attention they deserve. 3D Coat feels clunky with the sliders not working properly. Been asking Andrew to fix this forever and a day. But, no.....we have to keep adding features that an app that is barely out of it's initial Beta, has. I don't understand this argument that 3D Coat won't be relevant if it doesn't answer these new PBR tools. Maybe so, in the long run....but there are/were far more glaring issues that many of us who have been in the community for YEARS, have been waiting patiently on....only to see those requests ignored for a shiny new toy, requested by relatively new users.

 

Can't speak for others, but I can't help but feel somewhat stepped on by the flurry of these "Make 3D Coat just like Substance Painter" requests. Again, SP was in beta until a few months ago. I like PBR and appreciate Andrew's work on it, but I hope he keeps other long-time requests in view as well. 3D Coat is also a sculpting app and right now it has this big glaring ommission....no Sculpt Layers. A critical feature that has been in MB and ZB for a LONG time. All these "make 3D Coat just like Painter" requests keep pushing and pushing and pushing that further down the road. All the new requests keep stepping all over the request many of us have been waiting on for a long, long time.

[Carlosan]

As overall read is nice to understood how another software works.

 

But to make 3DC a Substance clone or Zbrush clone is not the way -from my point of view- to take.

 

If the users need Substance... they can buy it, why not ? All the apps have pro and cons.

[Malo]

If you all dont like the idea, for sure i am fine with it.

If you want to see other long time features finished first, sure i am fine with it.

And if this request wont be ever solved, it would be fine, too. I could life with it or i use the Substance Package

 

But dont call me i want a copy of Substance Painter in 3D Coat.

This would be the same, if i would say,

Hey you want Sculpting Layers like Mudbox, oh come on we dont need a Mudbox Clone in 3d Coat.

 

And if i remember correctly, 3d coat was the first with autoretopogy, and now mudbox and zbrush have it own ones.

And PS have solid colors, SP have fill layer, they do the same as far as i know, why should 3d coat not having that, too.

I done see a problem to have good features from other softwares in 3d coat.

 

Anyway, i am new user and dont have much experiance with 3d caot.

Edited January 26, 2015 by Malo

[AbnRanger]

If you all dont like the idea, for sure i am fine with it.

If you want to see other long time features finished first, sure i am fine with it.

And if this request wont be ever solved, it would be fine, too. I could life with it or i use the Substance Package

 

But dont call me i want a copy of Substance Painter in 3D Coat.

This would be the same, if i would say,

Hey you want Sculpting Layers like Mudbox, oh come on we dont need a Mudbox Clone in 3d Coat.

 

And if i remember correctly, 3d coat was the first with autoretopogy, and now mudbox and zbrush have it own ones.

And PS have solid colors, SP have fill layer, they do the same as far as i know, why should 3d coat not having that, too.

I done see a problem to have good features from other softwares in 3d coat.

 

Anyway, i am new user and dont have much experiance with 3d caot.

Sculpt layers are a CORE feature of digital sculpting applications, such as ZB and MB, which 3D Coat directly competes with. It is not some fringe addition. What's ironic is that 3D

Coat already has this feature....but in the wrong workspace. It's in the Paint Room, and FORCES sculpters to have to split their workflow up dramatically because the application mandates it. The lack of this functionality is the No.1 reason experienced ZBrush and Mudbox artists don't use 3D Coat to sculpt with.

 

We've had a number of extremely talented artists from major studios come and leave, largely because this critical feature doesn't exist (in 3D Coat's native sculpting environment). Another feature many of us have been waiting on with just the PBR toolset is SSS, for organics. But this incessant barrage of Andrew add this....because Substance Painter has it, means that feature, too, gets pushed back and back and back. Let's give Andrew a little breathing room so he can fulfill the feature requests he already has on the docket?  

[Mighty Pea]

I agree with you AbnRanger, but I personally don't use the sculpting room. So ofcourse my feature requests and votes are going to go to Paint Room related things, as yours as going to go towards Sculpt Room enhancements. The reason there are now a flurry of Paint Room requests is because Andrew is spending a lot more time on it now than he has in recent years. I hope you get what you want though, I agree that layers are great for sculpting, and not having them is a pain.

 

And Carlosan, come on man. We can't have fill layers because Substance Painter has them? I own Substance Painter, but I use 3DCoat.

There's a reason for this, but that doesn't mean I don't want to see non-destructive fill layers and mesh-based effects, the latter of whichare offered by a piece of middleware:

 

Substances.

 

Substance support is the top request on Trello, with massively more votes than the other Paint Room votes.

Edited January 26, 2015 by Mighty Pea

[Carlosan]

to all, sorry i was not very clear

i think this is a great idea and had my +1

 

I think that 3DC technology not allow to use substance system in the same way.

Concept is fine, implementation need a little more work

 

Andrew said Pilgway and Allegorithmic were talking about substance implementation inside 3DC last year, but still conversation is open. 

 

 

Mighty Pea: your conversation setting are off ?

[Mighty Pea]

Private messages, you mean? I'll look in my settings and enable them (edit: done!)

 

Anyway, I'm glad to hear that. I understand there are differences (as mentioned, the differences are why I'm staying with 3dcoat!), but I would love nothing more than substances within 3DCoat.

Substance Painter is amazing software as well, and I support them, but 3DCoat just works much better for my needs.

Edited January 27, 2015 by Mighty Pea

[Javis]

There is room for both fill layers and Substances in 3DC. The vocal minority shouldn't dictate what happens in the tool, only Andrew should. Substance support is very important, and somewhat easier to implement then say, sculpt layers.

 

Besides that, Andrew is working on the Paint Room right now, let's all be team players here, and help Andrew out with the Paint Room.

[Mighty Pea]

You're right, Fill Layers and Substances are two different sides to the non-destructive topic, and one shouldn't automaticaly exclude the other. I hope it didn't sound like I was suggesting so!

 

Here's an idea I had that's a nice 'first step' towards fill layers, that Andrew might be able to do easily, to give us something to use while he works on fill layers inside of 3DC:

 

Currently, if I send my layers to Photoshop and add a non-destructive item (fill layer, adjustment layer), it's rasterised when bringing it back into 3DC. This ofcourse makes sense, as 3DC doesn't support this layer type.

 

One possible solution is to save the psd with only that fill layer (for example) in the background, and lock the (rasterised) layer within 3DC so I can't edit it. Then, when you edit in Photoshop again, you load in the original layer from the backup psd so the user can edit it and send it back to 3dCoat.

 

Let me know how you'd feel about this, or if you see any glaring errors in my thinking. Thanks!

[Javis]

Hi MIghty Pea! No I wasn't suggesting you were saying that. I'm speaking more about what the extremely vocal don said. He beats his war drums like this is battle, but forgets it's just software.

 

Anyway, I think you're idea would be good. It seems like it would be a good workable solution the that problem. It would be very good if Andrew could do a 1:1 support for the .PSD format, as difficult as that would be (Lots of developers complain about how bad Adobe is with the PSD format and how hard it is to work with it as a developer). That way we can have vector, raster, fills, masks, clip masks, filters, etc.. That would be a good way to go. Imagine being able to have a "Smart" layer in 3DC with a smart filter that can be directly edited in both 3DC or PS. Now that would be really cool.

[RabenWulf]

I have a feeling that substances are the emerging standard for the PBR workflow and well, just how engines work dynamically with textures and shaders. I believe Allegorithmic went forward with this intent and have far more to gain with substances becoming an industry wide standard as opposed keeping it strictly inside of Painter/Designer.

[Ratchet]

I have a feeling that substances are the emerging standard for the PBR workflow and well, just how engines work dynamically with textures and shaders. I believe Allegorithmic went forward with this intent and have far more to gain with substances becoming an industry wide standard as opposed keeping it strictly inside of Painter/Designer.

 

 

This is not the emerging standard, because substances at run time cost prorcessing power and transformation compared to a fixed PBR shader direclty dealing with textures.

Substance engine is not used on games or they are rare. I could test some Unreal 4 demo with Substance engine, and the loading time was too much long , not possible for a real game, as it had to compile shaders and pre process lot of stuff. Also the demo just consumed too much memory at some point resulting in a crash.

 

The other painting side, i prefer a lot DDO that is lot more faster to make PBR textures , lot more intuitive than Substance designer and it's substances.

In photoshop with DDO you can mask any part with any shape, make layers as you want, it is familiar very friendly, while Substance is complicated, not as intuitive. And making thousand of nodes , while you make it with some selection and layers in photoshop, i find it exagerated.

 

Substance designer and materials are perhaps suited for people loving nodes work, but myself i work lot faster in photoshop and more intuitively.

It's jut my experience with texturing workflow.

Edited January 28, 2015 by Ratchet

[Malo]

Substance Designer is not a 2d painting app like PS.

You cant realy paint like in PS. Thats the reason why they start with Substance Painter.

 

But it is much more friendy to work with Designer or Painter, You dont have thousands of flopping and popping windows all the time if you do some changes.

Everything is in realtime.

 

The biggest benefit is, Painter and Designer are Standalone Apps,

You dont need some additional software like DDO, that wont works without PS.

Edited January 28, 2015 by Malo

[RabenWulf]

This is not the emerging standard, because substances at run time cost prorcessing power and transformation compared to a fixed PBR shader direclty dealing with textures.

Substance engine is not used on games or they are rare. I could test some Unreal 4 demo with Substance engine, and the loading time was too much long , not possible for a real game, as it had to compile shaders and pre process lot of stuff. Also the demo just consumed too much memory at some point resulting in a crash.

 

The other painting side, i prefer a lot DDO that is lot more faster to make PBR textures , lot more intuitive than Substance designer and it's substances.

In photoshop with DDO you can mask any part with any shape, make layers as you want, it is familiar very friendly, while Substance is complicated, not as intuitive. And making thousand of nodes , while you make it with some selection and layers in photoshop, i find it exagerated.

 

Substance designer and materials are perhaps suited for people loving nodes work, but myself i work lot faster in photoshop and more intuitively.

It's jut my experience with texturing workflow.

 

Sounds like you are basing that off your preferences (based on what you deem is easier) than anything actually going on right now.

Substances are trying to become (and doing a good job at it) an emerging standard in the PBR workflow. They are tightly integrated into some existing game engines including Unity and Unreal Engine 4. They specifically build an sdk for integration of both engines and asset creation software. Thus you can find integration in Modo, Maya, and 3ds max. Studios like Naughty Dog have built their game engine on top of software such as Maya and any game can make use of substances, though few at this point are pushing the dynamic shader/texture aspect just yet. You are also extremely wrong on the cost associated with substances, they are designed to be low cost and highly efficient in the space they take up. What might cost a MB or two for a set of textures will measure in the KB with substances. It literally is the emerging standard and by standard I mean just that... not that its the only way to do something PBR related but that its a common and or universal approach that can build bridges and push innovations...which is exactly whats happening.

Regarding DDO, Its a great photoshop plugin, but its also just that. It has limitations, requires being tied to photoshop as the core, and its not fast...its slow. Very slow compared to the substance workflows. Designer/Painter have a learning curve, yes, but also once mastered are extremely fast. Designer is more of a sandbox targeting the technical artist in which they can create just about anything.... DDO is not really designed with the technical artist in mind, which is fine... I prefer it that way most of the time myself. Thus they came out with both b2m and painter to fill that difference audience. Substances do so much more and remain dynamic, which DDO cannot claim after the fact. Its not really something you can compare to Substances, but both can pump out some maps.

[Ratchet]

And it's my way of working PBR, but now i prefer 3D Coat as i can stay with one software from sculpt to painting PBR stage

I prefer old simple way using layers. For exemple i create some erosion layer, then i select on some other layer the edges to erode, and i just paint on erosion layer using a mask or bush the erosion, it's simple as that. Substance Painter is better something i prefer, even if layer and menus manipulation are not natural and need a learning curve.

 

Thus you can find integration in Modo, Maya, and 3ds max. Studios like Naughty Dog have built their game engine on top of software such as Maya and any game can make use of substances,

 

You are mixing traditionnal modeling and texturing software.

I talked about substance engine, that has a cost, and i tried some Unreal 4 demo and it was too long pre process like a very long loading time. And textures processing even low cost on real time still remains impacting, as each node as some millisec impact, if you make a complex graph nodes for each material i doubt your game to perform good.

In gaming industry the practice is more to use Substance Designer to make final textures, designed to run on a fast fixed PBR shader.

http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=144111

But that work can be achieved with DDO or 3D Coat without needing nodes system.

 

Substance are good tools indeed, but like some other 3D artists i'm not very fond of nodes system

Edited January 28, 2015 by Ratchet

[Mighty Pea]

You don't need to use nodes. You can use substances made by others to paint with inside of 3DCoat, the same way you're now using PBR materials by Pilgway, and the presets that come with DDO.

 

You say you prefer to handpaint everything, but on a project such as Assasin's Creed I'm sure they welcomed Substance Designer as a massive timesaver. Personally, I love it for baking and setting up base materials. The rebaking workflow is really nice!