Paint textures on 3D objects

You can paint textures with the 3D Paint Tool using two types of brushes: Artisan brushes and Paint Effects brushes.

Artisan brushes use grayscale images to define the brush profile (or shape). You can select from 40 predefined brush shapes, or you can create your own shapes using any image format supported by Maya. You can paint, erase and clone textures using Artisan brushes.

Paint Effects brushes are defined by specific combinations of attribute settings and can be simple (like pen, pastel, oil paint, and pencil brushes) or they can simulate growth to get their look (like flowers, feathers, hair, and fire brushes). You can select the default Paint, Smear, or Blur brush to paint with, or you can select any preset brush from Visor or your shelves.

Warning

Displaying other surfaces significantly slows down painting. Display only the surface you are painting using Isolate Select or by hiding the other surfaces.
On textures larger than 512 (which have to be scaled down to appear in the hardware render), sometimes darker pixels appear where there are seams in the UV mesh. These do not show in the software render.
Changing shader assignment while in 3D Paint Tool will cause inconsistent display. Exit the 3D Paint Tool before reassigning shaders to the selected surface.
Switching UV sets while in the 3D Paint tool gives unexpected results. Exit the tool before switching UV sets.
When using the 3D Paint Tool in High Quality Rendering display mode, the display is not updated until the end of the stroke. This is necessary to maintain interactive painting performance.

To paint on a 3D object

Select the surface(s) you want to paint on.
NotePolygonal and subdivision surfaces must have non-overlapping UVs that fit within 0 to 1 in the texture space. In general, Automatic Mapping produces UVs that can be used for painting. For details, see the Polygonal Modeling and the Subdivision Surface Modeling guides.
Select the 3D Paint Tool and open the Tool Settings editor (Rendering menu set, Texturing > 3D Paint Tool > ). For information on tool settings, see 3D Paint Tool.
Click Reset Tool to reset the tool settings. Resetting the tool is a good practice to ensure you get expected results when you paint.
Beside Attribute to Paint (in the File Textures section of the Tool Settings editor), select the attribute you want to paint. The default is Color.
- If you have not previously painted or assigned file textures to one or more of the surfaces, the following warning appears on the Command Feedback line:
Warning: Some surfaces have no file texture assigned to the current attribute.

Also, the brush outline displays an X ( ) across it when you move the brush over the surface to indicate that you are unable to paint on the selected attribute texture.
- If you have previously painted or assigned file textures, you do not get the warning and the brush displays without the X, so you are ready to paint. Skip to step #7.
  NoteBe sure to assign a new shader before painting your object, otherwise you will modify the default shader. If this happens, the painted texture will be assigned to any new objects you create in your scene.
Click Assign/Edit Textures. The Assign/Edit File Textures window opens.
Enter a size for the texture in the Size X and Size Y boxes, then select an Image Format and click Assign/Edit Textures. The Keep Aspect Ratio option ensures that the proportions of the image are maintained. Turn this option off if you want the width and the height of the texture to be different. The texture size is currently limited to 2048 x 2048 and must be a power of 2 in each dimension. Larger textures require more memory. Textures larger than 512 will yield slower performance.
TipTo assign different-sized textures to different surfaces, select each surface or group of surfaces separately and assign textures to them. Once the textures have been assigned, you can select any combination of surfaces to paint on.
Set a base color for the model and save the texture. This establishes the texture you will erase back to. To do this, click the Color swatch in the Flood section and select a color from the Color Chooser. Set the Paint Operations to Artisan Paint, click Flood Paint, and then click the Save Textures button in the File Textures section.
Select a brush to paint, erase, clone, smear or blur. For details, see Select a brush.
Modify any other settings as required and drag on the model to paint. For information on these settings, see 3D Paint Tool settings.
If you are painting Single Channel (grayscale) attributes such as bump, or diffuse, the color you paint is automatically converted to grayscale.
Once you have finished painting one attribute, you can paint another attribute without leaving the tool by selecting the attribute beside Attribute to Paint. The first time you paint an attribute, you will have to assign a texture for it, unless a texture was already assigned in Hypershade.

Select a brush

The brush operation you select defines whether you are going to apply paint to the texture, or whether you are going to erase, clone, smear, or blur paint already applied to the surface.

You can apply paint to the texture using Artisan Paint Brushes or Paint Effects Paint brushes. To erase or clone you use Artisan brushes. To smear or blur you use Paint Effects brushes.

To select an Artisan brush to Paint, Erase, or Clone

In the Paint Operations section, select Artisan, Paint, Erase, or Clone.
Maya automatically selects the brush profile selected when you last used the Artisan Paint brush. (If the last profile was a custom brush, the operation remembers only that it was a custom brush, not which custom brush. If the custom brush was changed for either the Erase or Clone operations, it changes for the Paint operation and for any other operation with the custom brush profile selected.)

Use the Rotate To Stroke option to change the orientation of brush profiles that are not uniformly round. This option is not available for the Clone operation.
If you want to use a different brush profile, click the profile shape beside Artisan in the Brush section, or click Browse to select a custom profile. When you select one of the custom profiles provided with Maya, the Last Image File icon changes to show which image you selected.
If you selected Erase or Clone skip to step #5.
In the Color section, select a Color. If you are painting Single Channel (grayscale) attributes such as bump, or diffuse, the color you paint is automatically converted to grayscale.
Select an Opacity, if necessary.
In the Paint Operations section, select a Blend Mode, if necessary.
In the Brush section, modify the brush Radius (U) (Artisan), if necessary.
If the surface is very convoluted, you may prefer to turn Screen Projection on.

To select a Paint Effects brush to Paint, Smear, or Blur

Select a Paint Effects brush using any of the following methods:
- In the Paint Operations section, select a Paint Effects operation. If you select:
Paint - The brush becomes the last selected Paint Effects brush with a Brush Type set to Paint. If no Paint brush was previously selected, the default Paint Effects paint brush is used.

Smear - The brush becomes the last selected Paint Effects brush with a Brush Type set to Smear. If no Smear brush was previously selected, the default Paint Effects smear brush is used.

Blur - The brush becomes the last selected Paint Effects brush with a Brush Type set to Blur. If no Blur brush was previously selected the default Paint Effects blur brush is used.
- Click the Get Brush icon and select the brush from Visor. The paint operation changes to Paint Effects Paint, Smear, or Blur, depending on the Brush Type defined for the brush preset. Paint Effects Erase is not supported.
- Click a Paint Effects brush on a shelf. The paint operation changes to Paint Effects Paint, Smear, or Blur, depending on the Brush Type defined for the brush preset.
In the Brush section, modify the brush Scale (PFX) and Width (PFX) settings, if necessary.
Click the Edit Template brush icon in the 3D Paint Tool settings and make the changes to the brush settings in the Paint Effects Brush Settings window. Any changes you make to the settings are remembered the next time you select the Paint Effects Paint brush.
You can save these settings as a new preset by following the instructions under Create new brush presets, starting at step #3. To create the icon for preset (step #8), go into canvas mode, paint a stroke, grab the icon and return to the scene view without leaving the 3D Paint Tool.
Turn on Screen Projection in the Stroke section if the surface has seams, the UVs are cut up, you are painting across multiple surfaces, or the surface has uneven parameterization.

To select the last selected Paint Effects brush

Click the Last brush icon in the 3D Paint Tool settings and paint. The Paint Operation changes to Paint Effects Paint, Smear, or Blur, depending on the Brush Type defined for the last selected brush preset.

Erase paint

You can erase the strokes you paint by painting over them with the Artisan Erase brush. When you erase, you remove the color from the painted pixels, revealing the last saved texture.

To set the background texture to erase to, turn off Update on Stroke and click the Save Textures button. Flooding with the operation set to Erase restores the texture to its last saved version. You cannot erase when Update on Stroke is turned on, since the texture is constantly saved.

NotePaint Effects brushes with a Brush Type of Erase are not supported in the 3D Paint Tool.

Clone paint

You can clone an area of the texture (duplicate it) and then paint that sample elsewhere on the texture or on other textures. There are two cloning approaches: dynamic and static.

With dynamic cloning, the clone source moves as you paint. In the following Dynamic Clone example, a small area of the top eye was set as the clone source. Painting below the eye gradually reproduced the top eye. In the Static Clone example, the pupil was cloned and stamped.

To clone an area of the texture and paint with it

In the Paint Operations section, click Reset Brushes to reset the brush settings. Resetting the tool is good practice to ensure you get expected results when you paint.
In the Paint Operations section, select the Artisan Clone option.
The brush outline displays an X across it when you move the brush over the surface to indicate that you are unable to paint on the selected attribute texture until you set a clone source.

Maya automatically selects the brush profile selected when you last used the Clone operation. However if the last profile was a custom brush, the operation remembers only that it was a custom brush, not which custom brush. Changing the custom brush for one operation changes it for any other operation with the custom brush profile selected.
Select a Clone Brush Mode: Dynamic or Static.
By default, the Clone Brush Mode is set to Dynamic. With dynamic cloning, the cloned area changes as you paint, moving alongside your stroke and maintaining a constant distance from the stroke path. This is an effective way to copy areas from existing textures.

Select Static to keep the clone source stationary.
Click Set Clone Source and click an area where you want to clone the texture. A brush outline stays on the area where you clicked.
If the Clone Brush Mode is set to Dynamic, click another area on the texture to define the offset between the clone source and your paint stroke.
Paint on the model where you want the cloned texture to appear. As you paint, the clone source moves alongside the stroke, maintaining the offset defined by your second click.
If you paint over the clone source during a stroke, the original paint sample is used for the rest of the stroke, but the next stroke uses the updated clone source paint sample.

Smear and blur paint

Smearing with a Paint Effects Smear brush blends adjacent colors together along the stroke path.

Blurring with a Paint Effects Blur brush softens the edges of adjacent colors by averaging their color values.

You can use the default Paint Effects Smear or Blur brushes or select any Paint Effects brush with a Brush Type set to Smear or Blur. To select the default Smear or Blur brushes, click Reset Brushes and in the Paint Operations section, select Paint Effects Smear or Blur, as appropriate. Use the Blur Intensity option to adjust the blur effect.

Set an image to erase back to

Using the Set Erase Image button you can set the current paint layer as what to erase back to.

Example of using Set Erase Image

Paint a base layer, such as a layer of dirt.
Click the Set Erase Image button.
Flood the layer with a color, such as grey.
Erase patches and the dirt layer shows through.

Reset brushes

You can reset the Artisan and Paint Effects brushes to their default profiles and settings by clicking the Reset Brushes button. The default brushes will now be used the next time you select these operations.

Undo brush strokes

You can undo as many strokes as defined in the Undo category of the Preferences window ( Window > Settings/Preferences > Preferences).