Working with decals in the scene

Materials > Apply decals >

Add decals to material alternatives

Decals can be added to material alternatives. Each alternative can show the same decal with different material properties, positions, or decal textures. The order of decals on objects can also be added to material alternatives.

Apply and position decals and base materials to the objects in your scene.
Press A (or Scene > Alternatives) to open the Alternatives interface.
Create a New Material Lineup.
Select the decal grip and press the Add Next Alternative button.
Apply a new material to the selected decal grip or adjust the decal texture (Shift+M), and Add another Alternative.
Click on the icon for each alternative in the lineup to see the differences.

NoteEach alternative creates copies of your decal for every object it is applied to. To avoid excessive amounts of materials in the scene, optimize the objects in the scene as much as possible before creating decal alternatives.

For more information on alternatives and lineups, see Set up alternatives.

Optimize decal performance

Decals use extensive system resources to be drawn in the scene, and can affect the interactivity of scenes.To improve decal performance, optimize the scene first (grouping objects and combining entities), then apply decals to objects in the scene.

For more information on combining, see Combine and separate objects to improve frame rate.

Decals applied to Combined objects use only a single decal for all surfaces that are combined together.
Decals applied to grouped objects, or multiple selected objects, create copies of the decal for every object in the group or selection.

NoteRemove decals before uncombining objects. If a combined object with a single decal is uncombined into 20 objects, there will be 20 copies of the decal added to the in scene materials

Decal texture image recommendations

The size and type of image used for decal textures can affect performance. Use only enough resolution and color for the intended output. Some general guidelines (but not limits) for decal texture images are:

8-bit grayscale TIFF or PNG format files.
No extra channels, layers or transparency in the image files.
Under 1000 x 1000 pixels. The input size is limited only by your video memory, but consider how many copies of the decal are being displayed.