Documentation Substance 3D Substance 3D Designer

Height Extrude

Last update: September 11, 2026

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In: Texture Generators > Patterns

Description

Height Extrude renders 3D Z-Depth from an input Height map. Just like Shape Extrude and Cube 3D it lets you spin a camera around in the 2D View. Its main goal is to serve as a Generator for creating 3D-rotated shapes from a flat heightmap. These shapes can then be used with Shape Splatter.

The main diffence with Shape Extrude is that the input map does not have to be a binary “alpha” type of map, but a full-range grayscale map. This means you have more control over the extrusion height (Organic, complex shapes), but no control over anything like beveling profiles (Hard-Surface, simpler shapes).

Parameters

Camera Angle

Euler angles of the camera, in half-turns. Please note that horizontal rotation and scale are applied directly to the input.

Camera Scale 0.001 - 3.0

Global scale applied to the output.

Height Scale 0.0 - 2.0

Applies a global factor on the input height values.

Vertical Offset -1.0 - 1.0

Moves the final output up or down.

Ground Off/On

If Ground is off, a black background is shown where the input is 0 rather than a ground-like plane.

Normal Format DirectX/OpenGL

The Normal Format parameter inverts y coordinate of the normal map.

Normal Intensity 0.0 - 256.0

Same as Intensity parameter of Normal node. Set it to 256 to get a shar-free normal while rotating.

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