Improved 3D effects and Adobe Substance materials
We have introduced new and improved '3D and Materials' effects in 26.0 this year. These effects have been fully rebuilt using modern rendering technology and apart from being much more stable than classic 3D effects, they also allow you to:
* Apply and edit 3D effects conveniently through a non-blocking panel with real time preview.
* Texture artwork using Adobe Substance 3D materials that are highly adjustable. Choose from built-in materials in the panel or upload your own.
* Light up artwork with environment and directional light along with shadows.
* Create smooth and curvy extrusions using the new Inflate option.
* Rotate artwork more easily using the new on-canvas controls.
* Once you've setup your 3D object, render it using Ray tracing with adjustable quality options.
There are more features we're actively working on bringing to these effects. Please share your feedback and suggestions from your experience of using these new effects.
There are now several separate requests made, based on the feedback in this thread:
1. Regarding adjustable color and opacity for 3D shadows:
https://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/333657/suggestions/47054086
2. Regarding presets for each tab in 3D and Materials panels: Object, Materials, Lighting:
http://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/333657/suggestions/47350001
All those who commented on the topic until October 16, 2023, are already added as voters there. If this is something you want to have for 3D and Materials in Illustrator — please upvote it. If possible — create new requests and bug reports about 3D, rather than commenting here inside. This will help the team to better prioritize efforts on making the feature better. As always — thanks for the feedback! It helps.
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Ryan Donahue commented
I don't care about being able to use a 'marble texture' or 'animal print' textures - I just want to map artwork!
Also, instead of having to make a compound of several elements - is there a way to make each object share the same 3D & perspective, but use a different color or belvel?
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Jon Measures commented
I like the new options but the lack of perspective adjustment is a bit baffling. I also wish I could expand the art into vectors again.
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Brandon MacInnis commented
I use the 3D in Illustrator all the time. I much prefer what you are now calling "Classic" to the new 3D for several reasons:
1. The whole point of using Illustrator is to create vector art. So I want the look and functionality of vector art and don't need the materials or ray tracing (and if I do, I just use a 3D program which has more capabilities).
2. On the "new" 3D, if you expand it, you are left with only an image without any of the vector information. I use the "Classic 3D" all the time to generate vector shapes by expanding the 3D elements. I need that for my work flow and the "new" 3D is missing that feature.
3. To see what a truly great 3D experience can be in Illustrator, please look back at Adobe Dimensions. That was an amazing program that allowed full placement of multiple objects in a 3D space (as opposed to the current single object limitation in both new/classic). It retained vector information and the clean look of vector art. If you could take the old Adobe Dimensions code and add it as plugin to illustrator, that would solve all my clumsy work-arounds to get multiple objects to look as if they inhabit the same 3D space.
4. Please do not eliminate "Classic" 3D! This is an important feature to me. Ideally, I would like to see the features of "Classic" expanded to include more features that previously existed in Adobe Dimensions. Thanks!
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Travis Slade commented
Please add the perspective option to the new 3D tools. The new tools are awesome! Just missing perspective.
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Jeff Wine commented
This looks promising after only using it for a few minutes, but please include the perspective option to the rotation section. Unless you're doing something fairly academic like shown in the example, you really need to be able to have perspective to your objects.
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Mario commented
Please add the option to create our own materials, will be great...!
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Denis Landin commented
Great job! And a really promising tools.
But why is it so slow?
I have the GPU Performance on, my video card is RTX 2080Ti 12 GbI should be 150fps, but not rendering a simple extrude for 20 seconds.
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Alex York commented
This is a massive improvement from what the 3D capabilities were. But utilizing edge detection/ geometry to influence the material is needed for this to be a worthwhile tool (Smart Materials).
Maybe I'm missing this disclaimer somewhere, but I haven't seen where it states Smart Materials are not supported. However, I cannot import them into illustrator - only plain materials.
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Barry Hincks commented
Please bring back the "mapping" feature to the "Revolve" section of "3D and Materials." I can warp type with a gradient mesh (often with just a single row and a single column) but matching shadows across a surface, for package design and product design, is a royal pain. I tried to attach a ".ai" file, and then a ".pdf" version of a small example (a single object: a toy top) but just got a spinning cursor here. I'm trying to attach a ".jpg" of that file now. Thanks, Barry
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Akshay Varshney commented
@Mordy: Can you please provide the video of the issue. Thanks.
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Mordy Golding commented
When scaling an object, the 3D effect does not seem to scale, even when the Scale Strokes and Effects setting is activated. I don't seem to be able to resize any art with 3D effects applied.
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Rae commented
I tried adding in materials from the Adobe substance 3D community, but there was no way to import the ".spsm" file I downloaded from the site. The only option listed as "Enable: Sbsar Files (*.Sbsar)" and nothing else. Maybe I'm missing the trick to importing a 3D material to use in Illustrator?
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Abby Berke commented
I'm trying to create a 3D rendering of a logo using the inflate tool, and each vector within the logo inflates individually, even though they are grouped. I would love to see an option that lets you inflate groups as a whole, to give a puffy sticker look.
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Jarred Eberhardt commented
I'm in complete agreeance with Frank Bridges. After testing out the new features within the 3D options, the first thing to come to my attention was the removal of the perspective functionality. I see the link in the dropdown to utilize the "Classic" features of 3D, but the integration of the 2 would have the best output...However, I'm sure this idea is in the works
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Frank Bridges commented
After working with the 3D effects and Materials, my first suggestion would be to include perspective parameters within this effect. This would add another level of realism to the overall output. If this is already one of the additional features you are working on, then great.
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Ben Thomas commented
Thank you for your valuable feedback! We are excited to announce some updates to the Beta based on the feedback we've received over the past weeks. The build is available for download in Creative Cloud desktop app in the Beta section. In the coming weeks we might release updates more frequently and we recommend that you enable auto-updates to ensure you're on the latest build.
The latest build contains the following updates:
1. Unified panel for 3D geometry, materials and lighting.
Apply through the effect menu (Effects > 3D > Extrude) or directly from the panel (Window > 3D)2. Real-time editing
We've introduced a dedicated real-time renderer which will allow you to quickly work on your artwork before rendering it in high quality using the Ray Tracing renderer. You can choose the renderer and quality from the render settings popup3. Vectorized appearance
You can now render your 3D effect in vector. Choose between Vector and Raster outputs in the render settings popup.4. Live editing
You can now see changes made to the sliders and inputs in the 3D panel apply to the artwork instantly.5. Material resolution up to 8K
You can choose from 1024px to 8192px for materials. Ensure resolution in DRES is increased appropriately to see high resolution results. Rendering will take much longer than usual.6. Apple M1 support
3D effects are now supported on Apple M1 devices. Rendering should be much faster on this platform.Few known issues we're working on fixing soon:
1. Shadows do not appear while in the Real time renderer. To see shadows, please switch to Ray Tracing.
2. Transform properties (offset, rotation, density) of Materials do not work while in Real time renderer. -
Rob Hutchings commented
Any chance of adding gimbal like control like in classic where you could grab the cube to adjust? The overlay UI on the artwork is fine initially when your artwork is flat but as soon as you rotate along an axis they become confusing since movement no longer correlates to what the icons represent.
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Dallas commented
It's not in my Beta version and I just downloaded it. It only shows 3D - Classic
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Ben Thomas commented
Thank you Mr. Ponce for sharing your feedback. Here are some responses to your main points.
1. We will have a switch to turn the rendering on or off. When rendering is off, you'll be in real-time preview mode (although at a slightly lower quality). You will be able to try this in a release that's coming in a few weeks time.
2. Materials will not be a separate panel and will be integrated into the 3D effects panel. We are working on ways to save custom material configurations that you should have available across sessions.
3. We are working on a better rotation controls which you will be able to try in the August Beta release. Would appreciate your feedback on that.
4. Ability to add multiple lights is on the roadmap. This might come in later in the year.
5. We're adding the ability to remove material from the 3D effects panel. So from Appearance panel, you can open the 3D effects panel and see which material is applied and remove it if you wish.
6. We will work on the seamlessness of materials as they wrap around edges.
7. The highlights you're seeing on the shadows are possibly because of the ambient or environment light. Could you try with environment light turned off?
8. We're fixing the resolution for the 'high' setting. It should be much more sharper in the July beta release.
9. We're working on expanding into vector shapes. This should be available to try in July or August beta release.
10. Render quality should be much higher in upcoming releases. Do try and let us know.
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Mr. Ponce commented
There definitely has to be a toggle that turns off the renderer while you make some edits to the base shape. Otherwise the renderer get in the way of minor edits so much so that it gets slow and frustrating.