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Participant
January 13, 2026
Under Review

Recalculate stroke position based on topology

  • January 13, 2026
  • 2 replies
  • 92 views

Currently the way strokes are stored in 3D space makes Substance 3D Painter a really cool tool for non-destructive workflows. I love how you could literally change the topology and UVs and keep your texturing work.

Unfortunately this becomes a bit of a problem (specially with character work) where I keep doing modelling updates (no topo or UV changes, just shape) and reimporting the mesh would make my texturing work break, as parts of the model move around a bit but the strokes stay in their original place in 3D space.

It would be really really amazing if one could choose to update stroke position based on topology instead of 3D space. Even if its not perfect, most texturing work is through masks anyways. Existing stroke points would have to bind to the model (similar to a Maya wrap or a Blender surface deform) and move to their new position. If using face normals this could even allow rotation. This would unlock full non-destructive workflows in Substance 3D Painter.

At the moment, my only workaround is to manually export masks as texture maps and re-import them back so they follow UVs.  That unfortuntely removes the flexibility Painter offers by default. Or even worse, I avoid updating my geo at all in Painter and keep working on my old model and checking updates elsewhere. The current 'Preserve strokes position on mesh' has to do with geometry boundaries only. 

I am aware this sounds like a big thing, but if strokes are points in vector space, it should be doable. I think it would be an amazing feature.

    2 replies

    Participant
    January 19, 2026

    Hi @Cyril Dellenbach 

    thank you so much for the insight! I had no idea strokes were stored in the projection box. I see how then altering the box messes up the projections. It sounds like really the only the approach would be to project strokes from the box onto the geometry, bind it, do the geometry update and then project it back onto the box. At least on paper 😄

    Best,

    Juan

    Cyril Dellenbach
    Community Manager
    Community Manager
    January 14, 2026

    Hello @defaultcm1qz8zy5e6o,

     

    This would indeed be an amazing feature and that is something we're frequently discussing. We know the current reprojection in Painter is quite limiting and non-friendly for iteration workflows.

     

    However, as you mentioned, this wouldn't be a small implementation and the current behavior isn't based on points in vector space. Currently, each strokes are basically projections on the Bounding box, so if the mesh changes in proportion, the same goes for the Bounding box, "corrupting" where painting strokes should be.

     

    It doesn't mean we will never make the feature, but simply that it wouldn't be trivial to develop. 

     

    Best regards,

     

    Cyril Dellenbach (Micro) | QA Support Artist | Adobe