This free app could become the Blender of texture painting software

(Image credit: ArmorPaint) Copy link Facebook X Whatsapp Pinterest Flipboard Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter While it almost every other industry seems to be trying to copy the Adobe…

(Image credit: ArmorPaint) Copy link Facebook X Whatsapp Pinterest Flipboard Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter While it almost every other industry seems to be trying to copy the Adobe subscription model these days, the good news is that it might be the best time ever for artists who want to build their workflows around free creative tools. Open-source Blender is well established for 3D modelling and animation, and we now have free After Effects alternatives in Maxon's Autograph and Canva's Cavalry.But although Blender can be used for texturing, most 3D artists I speak to use Adobe Substance 3D Painter. It's faster, more specialised and better integrated into professional pipelines. However, a new Substance 3D Painter alternative is showing a lot of promise. Open-source ArmorPaint is lightweight and now available for whatever platform you might want to work on. Image 1 of 4 ArmorPaint (Image credit: Armory3D) (Image credit: ArmorPaint) (Image credit: ArmorPaint) (Image credit: ArmorPaint) Image 1 of 4 View Original Image 2 of 4 View Original Image 3 of 4 View Original Image 4 of 4 View Original Developed by Lubos Lenco and the team behind the open-source game engine Armory3D, ArmorPaint has been in early access for eight years. Version 1.0 has finally been released into the wild, and it's available to download for Windows, Linux, macOS, iOS and Android (the latter two being experimental for now).Latest Videos FromCreative BloqWatch full video here: The app allows real-time texture painting in a path-traced 3D viewport and can be used to generate PBR texture maps ready for use in the best 3D modelling software, animation software or game engines as PNG, JPEG or EXR at up to 32-bit colour depth. Assets can be brought in via the usual formats or as Blender scene files, and materials can be created via a node-based material editor or by importing PBR texture maps.The app has a custom-built 3D engine and 2D drawing system and supports ray tracing via Direct3D 12, Vulkan, Metal, and WebGPU graphics interfaces. Recent updates have added Decimate, Smooth, Bevel, and Subdivide modifiers for mesh editing, a basic UV map editor, Neural Nodes for generative AI features, photo-to-material generation, skinning animation playback and support for tween animations.A code rewrite in C allows interactive painting on bigger 3D assets, with more texture layers at higher resolution. A clean up of the codebase has also slashed the program's size. Armory's team says it could now fit on two 1.44MB floppy disks.On desktop, it runs as a sub- 10MB portable application with no installation and near-instant start up (you might want one of the best laptops for 3D modelling or the best graphics cards). There are also plugins for Blender, Unity and Unreal Engine.Get the Creative Bloq NewsletterSign up to Creative Bloq's daily newsletter, which brings you the latest news and inspiration from the worlds of art, design and technology.See the videos below for walk through on some of the recent updates. You can download the free texture painting software from ArmorPaint.org. 3D Particle Tool in ArmorPaint - YouTube Watch On Path and Curve Layers | ArmorPaint - YouTube Watch On Character Animation | ArmorPaint - YouTube Watch On TOPICS Joe Foley Freelance journalist and editor Joe is a regular freelance journalist and editor at Creative Bloq. He writes news, features and buying guides and keeps track of the best equipment and software for creatives, from video editing programs to monitors and accessories. A veteran news writer and photographer, he now works as a project manager at the London and Buenos Aires-based design, production and branding agency Hermana Creatives. There he manages a team of designers, photographers and video editors who specialise in producing visual content and design assets for the hospitality sector. He also dances Argentine tango. View More You must confirm your public display name before commenting Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name. Logout LATEST ARTICLES 1 Steal this art trick: paint with fewer colours and bigger brush strokes 2 RTX Spark's local AI wants to be your chief of staff, but it’s not ready to run the office yet 3 Viral video tries to prove AI is the death of Hollywood... and fails miserably 4 These wireless earphones offer sound quality to rival wired buds, and they're down by 32% 5 Apple iPhone 18 event LIVE: Folding iPhone, new AirPods and more – every announcement as it happens

Source: Creative Bloq AI Art — Published September 8, 2026 at 15:00 UTC — Category: Image AI