Originally released in 2014, Substance Painter has gone through several revisions ever since, both major and minor. In fact, Allegorithmic has been continually issuing a new release every two to three months!

Paid Licenses

Currently in version 2019.2.3, Substance Painter follows a licensing model, depending on the type of user. It has three levels of paid licenses:

• Indie (for independent developers)
• Pro (for professional users)
• Enterprise (for enterprises)

The differences between the two first categories are a bit vague on a linguistic basis, but fortunately, there is a clean numerical difference between them: Parties with an income of less than $100K per year qualify for the (cheaper) Indie license. Enterprises have to earn more than $100M, and everyone else should go for the Pro version.

Discounted and Free Licenses

There are some special cases though, where the software is offered on more favorable terms:

• Universities & Schools: For educational institutes, the software is discounted (after communicating with Adobe).
• Students: The software comes free for students.
• Teachers: The software comes free for teachers.

For the last two categories, there are some conditions that have to be met. The free license will last for a year (but is renewable), and it has to be used on a personal computer for personal use (for which teaching doesn’t count).

For all categories of user, there’s also a trial option. It lets anyone use the software free of charge for 30 days from activation.

Although we’ve previously covered Substance Painter’s features in depth, it’s worth summarizing the main aspects, especially for the purpose of showing why the software is popular in the first place. Here’s what users (and industry reviewers) like:

• Large variety of tools and functions
• Large repository of usable textures, plug-ins, etc.
• Many export options
• Logical learning curve
• Large and knowledge-rich community
• Easy interaction with other software packages of the Substance Suite
• Sleek, friendly, and adaptable UI
• Speed
• Integration with popular game engines (e.g. Unreal, Unity)

If you can’t afford the cost of a full license or don’t qualify for the above “free license” categories, we have the answer! Just make friends with someone that has the license!

Realistically, though, it is quite difficult for any similar software to offer the combination and quality of features contained within Substance Painter. A combination of two or three other software packages could possibly balance the scale, however the convenience would be lacking.

All of that said, here are some programs one could explore:

• Blender: While it’s free and has a lot of features, especially for 3D modeling, Blender’s main focus isn’t texturing, thus making it hard to do some simple jobs.
• ZBrush: An intuitive software, ZBrush is good for hi-poly jobs and sculpting, but not very good with PBR rendering. Also, it’s rather costly.
• Mudbox: Mudbox is good for sculpting, adequate in texturing, and not so good in 3D model manipulation, with limited export capabilities.
• Sculptris: Sculptris is also free, but it’s better for sculpting, as it offers fewer features and limited textures.

Given the total number of features on offer, there seems to be a reason for Substance Painter to be considered the “king of its category”. Also helping sway popularity is the name Adobe, which provides an assurance that it will continue to evolve and stay at the top. In the end, though, it’s up to you to decide which platform best suits your needs.

(Lead image source: gnomon.edu)