Unlocking creative capability & motion workflows with Substance 3D, After Effects, and Cinema 4D

Welcome to the Substance 3D blog for April.

This month’s update is all about improving workflow, increasing productivity, and celebrating creative work done with Adobe Substance 3D. In April, we introduced the Substance 3D Connector, an open-source framework designed to simplify data transfer between Substance applications and 3D tools. At NAB 2024, Adobe showcased Substance 3D for Motion Design with integrations in Adobe After Effects and Cinema 4D. And at the recent GDC event, we launched new Firefly powered features in Substance 3D alongside our Substance Days event, where we met the games community to share knowledge and exchange tips and techniques for 3D content creation in games.

Let’s take a closer look at some of the great Substance 3D news for April.

Enhanced workflows with the Substance 3D Connector

Substance 3D Connector is an open-source framework designed to address the challenge of moving data between different 3D software tools. By streamlining this process, it improves efficiency and allows creators to focus on their work rather than data management. The project encourages collaboration among developers, artists, and industry partners, ensuring that it meets the community’s needs.

Initial efforts focus on enhancing ‘SendTo’ workflows, enabling seamless transfer of 3D assets between Substance 3D tools and popular applications like Blender, Unreal Engine 5, Unity, 3ds Max, and Maya.

With selective data exchange and flexibility, Substance 3D Connector is poised to benefit industries such as game development, film production, and product design visualization.

For more detail on the Substance 3D connector.

Substance 3D in Motion Design Workflows

In April, Substance 3D was center stage at NAB 2024, showcasing motion design workflows that combine the power of Substance 3D, After Effects, and Maxon’s Cinema 4D.

The convergence of Substance 3D with After Effects and Cinema 4D allows artists to create stunningly textured content for use in both applications. Artists may choose to work with textured 3D models natively in After Effects for creating versions quickly or when they need to mix 3D objects with 2D elements. They can also use the new native integration of substance materials in C4D for more sophisticated renders using Redshift. In addition to Substance Painter for texturing 3D models, motion designers can also take advantage of nearly 20,000 parametric materials, 3D models, and HDR environment in the Substance 3D Assets library and use Substance 3D Sampler to quickly create accurate materials from photographs and text prompts — perfect for supporting fast-paced motion design workflows.

Substance Days at GDC

At this year's GDC, we hosted a vibrant and informative Substance Days event, showcasing the latest innovations within the Substance 3D ecosystem. We also invited inspiring guest speakers who shared how the Substance toolset drives the creation of exceptional games.

The event included talks, demos, portfolio reviews, user-developer discussions, and knowledge-sharing sessions — all essential elements for supporting the game development community.

Read more about Substance Days at GDC.