Generally, the first step in the 3D process is to create a model or what is usually referred to as a mesh. By default, most meshes are a slate grey colour or can be viewed as a wireframe. 3D modelling software is used to create these objects. The next important step in the process is to add textures and materials to the object to create the visual appearance on its surface with a 3D painting software. While many programmes can do both of these tasks in the same application, Substance 3D Painter is the industry leader in texture painting, allowing you to texture a model in real-time.

Among all the Substance 3D texturing-related apps, we categorise Substance 3D Painter as medium difficulty. Painter aims to make the texturing and material creation process as streamlined as possible. Like most advanced software, Painter has many powerful features to learn and understand to maximise your output with the app.

When creating a new project and adding a mesh object, Substance 3D Painter offers several import settings you can use to extract information from the object, including textures. You can also import baked maps automatically. When your project is complete, you can export bitmap textures or export the geometry of the model. The export window can be opened through File > Export textures. For a complete overview of the export settings available and how to use them, please refer to the Substance 3D Painter documentation.

Substance 3D Painter is a 3D painting software that allows users to texture and add materials directly to 3D meshes in real-time. In comparison, Substance 3D Designer is primarily a material authoring software that generates textures from procedural patterns inside node-based graphs. So, Designer is an alternative to creating textures and materials, which you can apply to models inside Painter.

Substance 3D Painter is compatible with most major and standard 3D file formats. You can import mesh files into Painter to texture. Supported mesh file types include .fbx, .obj, .abc, .dae, .ply, .gltf, .glb, .usd, .usda, .usdc and .usdz. You can also export to these file formats as well. Substance 3D Painter will prepare the proper files, materials and textures required on export or you can use the export settings to customise this output to your needs. For more information, see the documentation.