Extracting materials values and textures

Last update: Thu Feb 26 2026 00:00:00 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)

The properties of materials can be extracted to be used in Substance graphs.

New graph from textures

Extract texture

Extract value

New graph from textures

The ‘Create graph from texture inputs action’ creates a new Substance graph with all the textures used by a material

A few things happen when using this action:

A Substance graph named after the material is created at the selected location.
A bitmap resource is created for every texture used by the material, and placed in a folder named after the material, under a ‘Resources’ folder.
In the graph, Bitmap nodes are created for each of these bitmap resources and automatically connected to Output nodes configured after the material properties using textures.
If each channel of a same texture is used to drive different material properties (the technique is called channel packing), Grayscale conversion nodes are automatically added to select appropriate channels.
The graph is automatically connected to the material and its appearance should not change until you make edits in the graph.

Create graph from texture inputs - Action in '3D View' viewport {modal="regular"}

Action in 3D View viewport

Create graph from texture inputs - Action in 'Materials' menu {modal="regular"}

Action in Materials menu

Create graph from texture inputs - Action in 'Properties' dock {modal="regular"}

Action in Properties dock

Result of graph creation from material textures {modal="regular"}

Result of graph creation from material textures

Demonstration

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TIP

You can access the action quickly and directly in the 3D View viewport, by placing the cursor on the object and pressing Shift+LMB to select it. then clicking RMB to access a contextual menu hosting the action.

NOTE

For formats using embedded textures (E.g.: USDZ), the textures need to be extracted and copied on disk. This results in an additional step to select the location that the textures should be extracted to.

Extract texture

The ‘Extract texture to graph’ action creates a new Bitmap node in an existing graph for a texture used by a material.

A few things happen when using this action:

A bitmap resource is created for the texture used by the material, and placed in a folder named after the material, under a ‘Resources’ folder.
In the selected graph, a Bitmap node is created for that bitmap resource and automatically connected to an Output node configured after the material property using that textures.

If an Output configured for the material property already exists in the graph, then no nodes are created and only the bitmap resource creation is performed.

E.g.: Extracting a texture for the ‘Base color’ property to a graph already hosting an Output node configured for ‘Base color’ will result in no nodes created in the graph.

Extract texture to graph - Action in Properties dock {modal="regular"}

Action for material property in Properties dock

Extract texture to graph - 'Select destination graph' dialog {modal="regular"}

‘Select destination graph’ dialog

Result of the texture extraction {modal="regular"}

Result of the texture extraction

Demonstration

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The ‘Extract texture as resource’ action only creates a bitmap resource for the texture used by the material, and places it in a folder named after the material, under a ‘Resources’ folder.

NOTE

For formats using embedded textures (E.g.: USDZ), the texture needs to be extracted and copied on disk. This results in an additional step to select the location that the texture should be extracted to.

Extract value

The ‘Extract value to graph’ action creates a new Value processor node in an existing graph for a material property value.

A few things happen when using this action:

In the selected graph, a Value processor node is created for that property value and automatically connected to an Output node configured after that material property.
In the Value processor node’s Substance function graph, a constant node matching the value type is created, set to the extracted value as set as the graph’s output.

If an Output configured for the material property already exists in the graph, then no nodes are created.

E.g.: Extracting a value for the ‘Anisotropy level’ property to a graph already hosting an Output node configured for ‘Anisotropy level’ will result in no nodes created in the graph.

Extract value to graph - Action in Properties dock {modal="regular"}

Action for material property in Properties dock

Extract value to graph - 'Select destination graph' dialog {modal="regular"}

‘Select destination graph’ dialog

Extract value to graph - Constant node in Value processor node's function {modal="regular"}

Constant node in Value processor node’s function

Result of the value extraction {modal="regular"}

Result of the value extraction

Demonstration

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