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Adobe acquires Allegorithmic makers of Substance Painter & Designer

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  • Noren
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    Noren polycounter lvl 19
  • joebount
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    joebount polycounter lvl 12
    Could be worst, could be Autodesk....
  • Nam.Nguyen
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    Nam.Nguyen polycounter lvl 9
    joebount said:
    Could be worst, could be Autodesk....
    Yikes . . . 
  • m4dcow
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    m4dcow interpolator
  • pasha_sevez
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    pasha_sevez polycounter lvl 13
  • jRocket
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    jRocket polycounter lvl 18
    This is a sad day for game devs.
  • Ashervisalis
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    Ashervisalis grand marshal polycounter
    For just $45 per month, you too can rent Substance Painter! If you're a student and $45 is too expensive, you can just pay $18.95 per month for Substance Painter Light, which has almost all the regular functions, except multiple texture sets, custom environments, and the ability to export above 1024 maps.
  • LaurentiuN
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    LaurentiuN interpolator
  • Udjani
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    Udjani interpolator
  • kadeschui
  • musashidan
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    musashidan high dynamic range
    This is an absolute tragedy. Essentially the end of Substance excellence and innovation as we know it.
  • Andreicus
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    Andreicus polycounter lvl 6
    I had an heart attack when i read the title of the thread so i said "must be a joke"...unfortunately it is not.

    Press F to pay respect
  • Aabel
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    Aabel polycounter lvl 6
    So incredibly disappointing. Allegorithmic will no longer serve the needs of the artists who are their customers, but the needs of their investors who are their masters.

  • musashidan
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    musashidan high dynamic range
    Time to load up on Substance Share/Source assets because Adobe shareholders will want to squeeze that for a few more dollars.

    Just went to the Allegorithmic forums to confirm and there are 11 pages of doom and gloom, outrage, disappointment, and the eulogies have already begun.....

    Just look what Adobe did to Mixamo. Corporations kill creativity by definition. 

    This is a sad day for artists.
  • Alex_J
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    Alex_J grand marshal polycounter
    Ignorance is bliss and I just killed it by reading this thread. 

    I had no idea Adobe had a bad rep among artist. And I've always been wishing photoshop and painter could merge. 

    Is there no silver lining at all? Is Adobe that awful?


  • musashidan
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    musashidan high dynamic range


    Is there no silver lining at all? Is Adobe that awful?


    In 25 years Adobe have killed off countless innovative programs. They are the Adesk of the 2D graphic world. 

    It may not be for a few years, but Substance tools, as we know them, will suffer greatly. Yes, you'll hear the usual cheerful and optimistic replies from devs whose company has just sold out to a corporation: 'oh, everything will stay the same. We're one big happy family now.....'

    Bullshit. I've seen it countless times over the years. So many great programs and plugins murdered ruthlessly or left to die on the vine by corporations.

    Also, there's the pricing plan to consider. They'll keep squeezing. It's how share-driven, profit margin companies work. They suck the blood dry. Adobe are a notoriously bad company in terms of customer relations. Giant corporations always are. But, I don't really give a shit abut the pricing in comparison to the creativity and innovation that will surely suffer.
  • Alex_J
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    Alex_J grand marshal polycounter
  • throttlekitty
    Ignorance is bliss and I just killed it by reading this thread. 

    I had no idea Adobe had a bad rep among artist. And I've always been wishing photoshop and painter could merge. 

    Is there no silver lining at all? Is Adobe that awful?


    I put my thoughts on the topic subforum thread. But IMO Adobe has a sketchy track record, but they're a big (and successful) company, so it's to be expected, yeah? Small Indie = good, Big Corporation = eeeeeeeevillll!! But a creative-driven studio will often struggle or fold compared to a business-driven one, so it's a double-edged sword.

    Something they're known for is buying companies/software, and either integrating killing them; for better or worse. Really all we can do is speculate on the future and loot the convenience stores for good measure.
  • Udjani
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    Udjani interpolator
    @BIGTIMEMASTER Its not the end of the world, but in about six months you will start to see allegorithmic name in a very different way. 

    Allegorithmic was consistently innovating their tools with really useful new features and bug fixes every few months, not even need to mention the good interaction with their customers, like youtube, support, good prices, and actually listening to what ppl wanted. 

    And Adobe, oohh Adobe, took them 10 years to fix bugs that people were complaning all the time with basics tool like brushes in photoshop, and new and usefull features happens every year or so and when it happens is very few things, pretty much the same type of complaining that max and maya users have with autodesk for years. 

    But hey, look at the bright side, if you want to use the ''second'' best tool for texture painting you need, err, an adobe licence. 
  • Alex_J
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    Alex_J grand marshal polycounter
    Well, until the day somebody gets the pitchfork mob assembled, hail the overlords!
  • musashidan
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    musashidan high dynamic range
    The best I can hope for is that Painter/Designer isn't bundled into the 'Creative Suite' bloatware package.

    My mind just keeps going back to a looong outrage thread on the Mixamo forums a year or so ago when Adobe killed off the UE4 integration overnight, with ZERO warning. The thread was full of indie devs whose entire projects were built around a Mixamo pipeline. Projects were either being rebuilt or scrapped entirely, while others missed deadlines and in the worst cases bankrupted the dev or studio.

    All the while a smug, satisfied 'PR woman' from Adobe, who clearly had no f**cking idea what a pipeline even was, repeated her same bullshit corporate platitudes with ZERO empathy, heart, emotion, or inkling of just what was at stake for some of these unfortunate bastards who might just have wasted 2 years of their lives and spent every penny they had. Corporations in a nutshell.
  • Aabel
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    Aabel polycounter lvl 6
    The best I can hope for is that Painter/Designer isn't bundled into the 'Creative Suite' bloatware package.
    Sadly I don't see any reason for them to not put the Substance suite into CC. The former CEO of Allegorithmic now directly reports to the executive VP who is responsible for Creative Cloud.
  • Alex_J
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    Alex_J grand marshal polycounter
    not that I don't trust @musashidan or have any reason to doubt, but how do I know he is right in this case? 

    Well, I just got an email (sure everybody did) from allegorithmic and the main premise was in belaboring the point that this merge won't stifle innovation but will in fact expand, etc. Haha. Ok, so now I really know exactly what to expect. Like when somebody prefaces "Now, no offense, but..."


  • musashidan
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    musashidan high dynamic range
    not that I don't trust @musashidan or have any reason to doubt, but how do I know he is right in this case? 


    Mate, you're brand new to this CG journey. When you become a grumpy vet and have been in this very moment many times before......then you will understand..... :)

    I'm not saying I'm right, but chances are that I am. Never underestimate the nature of a corporation to destroy creativity.
  • Alex_J
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    Alex_J grand marshal polycounter
    Oh, I believe you. I've never been really keen on big business happenings but I have some experience working for large, stifling bureaucracies. In fact I try to avoid news like this anymore because it gets me cranky. But you are right, at this point in my 3d life it really doesn't make a difference to me. My own personal day to day won't be effected. Well, it will, but I won't know the difference.
  • Brian "Panda" Choi
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    Brian "Panda" Choi high dynamic range
    Would anyone agree that as long as they keep the same sub model they've had for the last two years, we'll be at worst complacent about the acquisition?
  • Aabel
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    Aabel polycounter lvl 6
    Would anyone agree that as long as they keep the same sub model they've had for the last two years, we'll be at worst complacent about the acquisition?
    There is zero reason to believe things will stay the same. Adobe bought Allegorithmic because they see an opportunity to increase profits.
  • pasha_sevez
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    pasha_sevez polycounter lvl 13
    I don't mind if Autodesk would have "acquired" Adobe. Dust to dust!
    I wasn't that much upset since when Adesk bought Softimage and then killed it! 
  • Zack Maxwell
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    Zack Maxwell interpolator
    not that I don't trust @musashidan or have any reason to doubt, but how do I know he is right in this case? 

    Well, I just got an email (sure everybody did) from allegorithmic and the main premise was in belaboring the point that this merge won't stifle innovation but will in fact expand, etc. Haha. Ok, so now I really know exactly what to expect. Like when somebody prefaces "Now, no offense, but..."


    If you don't believe him, you can google it yourself. Adobe does indeed have a track record of acquiring and killing software. Mixamo is probably the most recent example.
    As for the email, stuff like that is always said on an acquisition in order to maintain customers. Even if they actually believe it themselves at Allegorithmic, it's irrelevant. Because Adobe are now the ones in charge, and obviously they would never let on to the company they're trying to acquire that they have any nefarious plans for them.
    There are countless, countless examples out there of small companies cheering about their acquisition while their new parent company was standing behind them cocking a rifle.
  • poopipe
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    poopipe grand marshal polycounter
    I said this in the other thread but... 

    It may not be all bad.   There's actually room for significant improvements in the way Allegorithmic implement features and importantly TEST their software. 

     Painter is a high risk update in  a production pipeline and honestly as the person responsible for keeping our substance pipeline working across multiple projects it terrifies me every time we decide to make the jump.


    On the other hand adobe could do what they did to photoshop and fuck it up to the point where it becomes a liability and a small French company pops their head up and steals all the customers
  • CreativeSheep
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    CreativeSheep polycounter lvl 8
    I predicted Adobe would buy Substance; it's not good news.  Although for me I use Mari, which I find it's time to shine is no better then now, not that is has been bad. 
    Pieces of Substance will be put into Photoshop and DimensionsCC; that's all I can say.
  • CommonOne
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    CommonOne polycounter lvl 6
    So guys - I am pretty new to the field, Sub Painter is all I really know about texturing. I refuse to use any Adobe products - not a fan at all. So I guess I'll be milking a perpetual version of SP for a couple of years. But what are some available options? As a hobbyist I can probably do with Mari non-commercial's limitations - not sure how big of a learning curve. I've read that Quixel is both crash-happy and almost out of business. But didn't people used to texture way before Allegorithmic? Was it rubbish compared to the current apps? I see a lot of people like Neil Blevins doing tutorials on methods in 2D editor - or blend box(?).  I've heard Ptex is good. I guess I'll miss the smart masks and generators the most. :(
  • Alex_J
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    Alex_J grand marshal polycounter
    @Zack Maxwell

    I think you guys misunderstood me. I was saying that even if I didn't believe musashidan (I do, he isn't saying anything crazy or unbelievable and I know he's been around in the industry for a minute) the emails sent out from allegorithmic do a great job of immediately reinforcing what he was saying. 

    Like, the first thing they are telling everybody is, "hey, don't worry about innovation and great support, blah blah blah." which just goes to show this is exactly what they expect everybody is going to be worried about.


  • throttlekitty
    I predicted Adobe would buy Substance; it's not good news.  Although for me I use Mari, which I find it's time to shine is no better then now, not that is has been bad. 
    Pieces of Substance will be put into Photoshop and DimensionsCC; that's all I can say.
    Aww come on, share some more of this secret insider info!
  • sacboi
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    sacboi high dynamic range

    poopipe said:

    On the other hand adobe could do what they did to photoshop and fuck it up to the point where it becomes a liability [snip]

    Damn hope not! would be just too awful to even contemplate...    

  • Synaesthesia
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    Synaesthesia polycounter
    CommonOne said:
    I've read that Quixel is both crash-happy and almost out of business.
    Quixel is our company, not our product. ;) The reports of our demise are incredibly exaggerated - we're doing better than we ever have as a company. The Suite itself is being discontinued in favor of focusing on Megascans and the Mixer and Bridge tools. Mixer itself is going to start incorporating Suite functionality into it, making it a true game art tool very soon.

    Edit: I don't want to appear to hijack this thread, we're just getting mentioned frequently and I've been correcting responses as I see them pop up.
  • Udjani
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    Udjani interpolator
    CommonOne said:
    I've read that Quixel is both crash-happy and almost out of business.
    Quixel is our company, not our product. ;) The reports of our demise are incredibly exaggerated - we're doing better than we ever have as a company. The Suite itself is being discontinued in favor of focusing on Megascans and the Mixer and Bridge tools. Mixer itself is going to start incorporating Suite functionality into it, making it a true game art tool very soon.

    Edit: I don't want to appear to hijack this thread, we're just getting mentioned frequently and I've been correcting responses as I see them pop up.

  • RS7
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    RS7 polycounter lvl 3
    Jesus Crist, this thread is pathetic. I have been using Adobes products since day 1 as i started working on CG field. It's been abut 8 years now and i'm telling you, i have tried out pretty much all the similar software there is and still keep using PS, AE and Illustrator. They are the best in their own kind.
    And... if Allegorithmic didn't want to sell, they did not have to. How about that? In fact, many startups and small development houses are actually wishing to make an exit via becoming a part of well established corporation. Belive it or not, that's actually some of theirs long term business goal to get an $$$$$ offer they would never make on their own and reach the goals they would most likley nver be able to reach alone. It's a business for pete's sake. How many people here could turn down an offer that secures yours and your grandchilds financial life for good? It would be nice and romantic idea to say that you would be the guy who says no, but when the money is on the table, you would probably consider the deal and try to make a fair contract as well as you possibly can.
    Just remember, Allegorithmic products has some pretty serious issues with all those constant updates and with the customer service. So, don't start to whine next time your Desinger crashes and don't curse on Adobe. Just remember.. It wasn't super fast and reliable software in the beginning with. And stop acting like a bunch of silly kids.

    >:) >:) >:)
  • Eric Chadwick
    One thread is enough. I would merge them, but that would inevitably mess up the conversation order. So, closing this and asking you to head here. Thanks... 

    https://polycount.com/discussion/208172/adobe-substance
This discussion has been closed.