Has anyone here used Allegorithmic's Substance Designer?

Substance designer is the no.1 reason for me to not upgrade my ff license!!! Maybe someone here is listening. I mean it seems to be superior, doesn't it? Maybe I'm wrong...? I'm not a power-user ... convince me

I suspect comparing the two programs is kinda like comparing an airplane to a helicopter... Both of them fly, both of them get you from point A to point B, and both of them can be used for cargo transport, BUT...
Each has it's own general use, and it's own strong points. So the answer to the question "which one is better" depends on what you need it to do.

My guess is, if you're not a power user, you don't NEED a $1000 piece of software, even if it has a feature or two the FF is missing.

Allegorithmic had made free software called Mapzone in the past , it is similar to FF.
Mapzone
This software has a noise generation called FX-Map similar to Bomber component of FF, and can make a high pliability and very various noise with it.
The decisive difference from FF is that its (probably) all the component is a bitmap based.
Compared with the sample base component of FF, its rendering speed is early, but anti-aliasing is dirty.
Unfortunately, development of Mapzone was stopped some years ago, and there is almost no writing in a forum, but there are many knowledge in Mapzone's samples which can be stolen to create filter with FF.

Yeah, FF and Substance Designer are definitely apples and oranges. Apples and stopsigns maybe. They're both red, and round... but used differently. Substance designer is a very specialized tool.

I'm really not trying to determine "which is better", because I don't think you can compare them. Was just wondering if anyone in this community had any opinions. (cough...Zoltan?)

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Substance Designer 2 COST 990$ !!!!!! BUT WAIT THERE IS EVEN MORE - FILTERS ARE NOT FREE !!!!

Dude, I know! Stuff aint cheap! (FWIW, I got mine for ~$600 US)

I've been secretly hoping that FF, inc would team up with someone like 'the produkkt' and make a more awesome version of their free realtime texturing tool. http://www.werkkzeug.com/
To see why it's awesome, check out their demoscene 'debris'... it's whole little movie packed into the ridiculously small 180kb. (!) I write emails bigger than 180kb. http://www.theprodukkt.com/debris/

I got yesterday the newsletter from this company with a good news,

They are LOWERING THE PRICE TO 590$ !!!! (BEFORE WAS 990$) and this is not an offer or discount.

So if any of you want to buy it now is the best moment with this great and very good price reduction.

I have tried this software myself, but is not useful for me, and do not know really how to use it but I want to leve this news here for anyone that KNOWS how to use this and could be useful.

This should be in the Off Topic forum.

FF for life!

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uberzev This should be in the Off Topic forum

YES, I agree with you, and is GMM that must move it.

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Skybase wrote it is a software geared towards a fairly specific use. It's not as free-for-all as FilterForge. FilterForge better because it has this "do whatever you want" sort of environment. Substance does but not to the same degree

YES, is true, this software is MAINLY for specific professional and industrial texturing and painting in 3D and for big companies that need to make specific things in their work, and this IS NOT as you have said very well, ""do whatever you want" sort of environment" because is NOT like FF, and is really more complex and less intuitive than FF and is not as friendly as FF for normal users, at least not for me

Is true that a very good point of this software is the integration with the 3D software as this is the main and specific use.

I like much better FF because is for making WHATEVER you want and is not specific and can create anything that would be possible with the available tools as shown already on the Online Library, and the filters are FREE, and not paid as in this other software.

The absolute main problem and most unwanted feature is [B]SPEED, This software have REALTIME PREVIEW and surely and the result is made MUCH FASTER than Filter Forge.[/B]

That looks cool. I wish FF could match all of the 2d features in Substance Designer.

I'll put my stamp of approval on it. But it comes with some thought.

Before you buy this, you need a good purpose to have it. This isn't FilterForge, this is a pipe-line tool. It's VERY HANDY if you use Maya, UDK, Unity, or any other compatible software on a regular basis. It makes sense if you use those tools because they're basically built for those tools and those purposes.

But you know, affecting photographs, generating graphical assets, the program tends to fall short of that functionality. I can promise you that you can do it there but the tool's really not oriented towards that. It's much oriented towards developing textures to be used internally in other software.

I love hearing the price drop. I was learning it back when I was in school and it's an absolutely fantastic piece of program if you have tons of assets to deal with.

And the price drop for all of those cool tools = amazing.

But yeah, keep in mind if you're doing 3D art on a higher "studio-level" I really recommend it.

The way I see it, graphics software can be like going into a DIY megastore. You see alot of cool power tools and shop machines and all kinds of amazing tools. You want them all, they're so cool, but... What are you gonna do with them?
You wouldn't buy a riding lawn mower to trim those potted plants on the balconey, would ya?