Substance Browser desperately needed

[Glockenbeat]

Hi there,

Well I was lucky enough to get access to the whole Substances database through Unity these days and I really like all the stuff created. However one problem now became more and more important, and it was before as well.

Actually I think this is a must-have and an addition which should be made as soon as possible: A Substance browser.

Right now I have my database of all those nice Substances created by you guys, plus additional substances created through B2M. Organizing those and especially selecting the right one for the purpose becomes a hassle.

The Player currently works only with a single substance loaded at a time. I tried the bonus tools for 3ds Max, which have a browser, but
- It does not support subfolders which are essential to keep things organized
- Requires me to work with the compact material editor rather than the slate material editor
- Crashes when generating thumbnail caches (Unknown System Exception either on line 377 or 391 in substanceBrowser.ms)

or in other words: it's not usable at all.

I really would like to see a substance browser built into the Substance Player, allowing me to easily access a library of all substances, supporting subfolders and all that alike.

Are there any plans for that?

Cheers,
Beat

[Wes McDermott]

Hi there,

Well I was lucky enough to get access to the whole Substances database through Unity these days and I really like all the stuff created. However one problem now became more and more important, and it was before as well.

Actually I think this is a must-have and an addition which should be made as soon as possible: A Substance browser.

Right now I have my database of all those nice Substances created by you guys, plus additional substances created through B2M. Organizing those and especially selecting the right one for the purpose becomes a hassle.

The Player currently works only with a single substance loaded at a time. I tried the bonus tools for 3ds Max, which have a browser, but
- It does not support subfolders which are essential to keep things organized
- Requires me to work with the compact material editor rather than the slate material editor
- Crashes when generating thumbnail caches (Unknown System Exception either on line 377 or 391 in substanceBrowser.ms)

or in other words: it's not usable at all.

I really would like to see a substance browser built into the Substance Player, allowing me to easily access a library of all substances, supporting subfolders and all that alike.

Are there any plans for that?

Cheers,
Beat

Hello,

We are looking at substance browsers for quick access viewing of substance files.

Cheers,

Wes

[Nicolas LIATTI]

If you have Substance Designer, you can visualize all your substances by adding them in the Library. It's not perfect, but it allows you at least to visualize all of them.

Cheers,
Nico

[alexzzzz]

I would be happy with a simple Windows explorer extension, that would show substance thumbnails instead of just icons.

[Mark B Tomlinson]

A QuickLook plugin for Finder would be awesome not sure how easy it would be though unless the Substances had an embedded icon as it would need to generate the preview each time I guess.

But yes this would be a very nice addition.

[Bajee]

With Substance Share this is going to be even more important. Please create a tool that lets us easily browse through a substance collection (preferably with live preview). Thanks!

[Speins]

Really desperately needed. As our library grows it becomes very slow to import all substances into Painter/Designer for preview.
Any news on this?

[JQL]

It would be great to generate previews on windows/mac too.

We have them for some model formats, every image format and a lot of other resources we work with daily so we are used to look at them on windows explorer. It would be great if substance would allow this too.

[Bit Barrel Media]

1+ for this.

[ryobg]

Damn! I was just browsing on the net & here to solve exactly this issue. Convenient view is a must!
* Thumbnail preview in Win Explorer and the other OS file explorers could be really nice.
* Dedicated library viewer (could be integrated with the Player).

Currently I'm thinking over using somewhat the batch tools to generate small images of each substance so that when I open the folder I can see which is what. Regretfully with sbsrender I can only export outputs but not the merged rendered preview... 

+10 for that feature!

[Bit Barrel Media]

I don't' think thumbnails cut it either. What we really need is an interactive viewer which allows you to see the effect of lighting at different angles.

[ryobg]

Yes, viewer is fine. But it seems like 3 years passed and no move here.

[SpaceRay]

I absolutely agree with the first post and all the others too requesting a substance browser to be able to preview all the substances material I may have in my own collection and so be able to choose the right one for what I may want.

What I mean with a browser to see my own collection of substances is similar to what can be seen in the https://www.gametextures.com/shop/ that you can see a thumbnail of all the available substances

how is possible that the first post is from May 2013 and in July 2017 it seems that there is still not available any kind of browser developed and created in these 4 years?

Please if there is any available and I am wrong, just tell me where it is

I really love much the substance technology and how they are made, and how they work. I own all the allegorithmic software pack, BUT I want to use other 3D software with substances, for example Unity 3D and Cinema 4D, so I need to preview any of the substances I may have.

I thought about buying the substance database collection, but have not done it because having hundreds of materials and not be able to preview them in some way, as there is no point for em to buy them if I can not be able to have a browser where I can preview them and choose the one I may want to use.

What is the point of continuing adding features to allegorithmic software and there no interest in making a SUBSTANCE BROWSER to be able to preview the substances materials you may have?

With gametextures.com and with substance share this is even more essential and needed to have to be able to preview what you download

Please, if there is any help about this topic would be greatly appreciated

thanks very much

[markus_schille]

+1

[hansolo]

20th of april 2018. Still waiting for a substance browser.