Material Smith

Version 1.0.0 Unreal Engine 5.6 – 5.8 MIT license

Material Smith is an Unreal Engine editor plugin that turns texture sets into material instances. Select T_Rock_BaseColor, T_Rock_Normal and T_Rock_ORM, click Create, and you get MI_Rock with every map in its parameter, the texture settings fixed and the instance assigned to SM_Rock.

What happens when you click Create

For every texture set you checked, Material Smith:

1. Detects the maps from the texture names: _BaseColor, _Normal, _ORM, _diff, _nor_gl, _ORDp and the other endings of its name table.
2. Picks the parent material: the Material Smith master M_Smith_Standard, created in /Game/MaterialSmith the first time it is needed, or a master material of your own.
3. Packs channels if you turned on Pack channels: separate roughness, metallic and ambient occlusion maps become one T_Name_ORM texture.
4. Fixes texture settings so every texture fits the sampler of its parameter: sRGB, compression, Flip Green Channel and virtual texture streaming.
5. Creates or updates the material instance (MI_Name) with every texture in its parameter and only the static switches the set needs turned on.
6. Assigns the instance to meshes named like the set, such as SM_Rock, or to the matching material slot of a multi-material mesh.

Features

• Name-based detection with a default table of 97 name endings that covers Unreal, Substance Painter, Fab / Megascans, Poly Haven and ambientCG names. Resolution and file type tokens such as _4K, _2048 or -JPG are ignored. The table is editable. See Texture set naming.
• Packed textures in any channel order: ORM, ARM, MRA, RMA and Megascans ORD are detected by name, and you can set the channels of any packed texture by hand.
• A master material in your project. M_Smith_Standard supports base color, normal, roughness, metallic, ambient occlusion (separate or packed), emissive, opacity and height (parallax). Your instances depend on that asset, not on the plugin. See Master material.
• Your own master materials. Material Smith guesses which texture parameter and static switch belongs to which map and stores the mapping in Project Settings. See Custom master materials.
• Texture settings that fit the material. See Texture settings.
• Channel packer, during instance creation or on its own page. Textures you imported are never overwritten. See Channel packer.
• Mesh assignment for static and skeletal meshes. See Meshes.
• Safe to run again. Existing instances are updated, not duplicated.
• Preview before you click. The panel lists what will happen for each set: packing, texture changes, the instance path, mesh slots and problems.
• Import suggestion. After you import textures that form a set, a notification offers to create the material instances.
• Python and Blueprint API through TAMaterialSmithSubsystem. See Python.

Where to find it

• Tools > ta Material Smith (in the tridiART section of the Tools menu) opens the panel. See Texture sets panel.
• Right-click textures or folders in the Content Browser and choose Create Material Instances, or right-click textures and choose Pack Channels.
• Settings are in Edit > Project Settings > Plugins > ta Material Smith. See Settings.

Supported versions

Unreal Engine	5.6, 5.7, 5.8
Platforms	Win64, Mac and Linux editor
Module type	Editor only (not included in packaged builds)
License	MIT

Note

Material Smith is a C++ plugin and the source code is included. The assets it creates (master material, default textures, material instances and packed textures) are regular assets of your project.

Quick links

InstallationAdd the plugin and create your first instances.

Texture sets panelEvery part of the panel, from selection to Create.

Texture set namingHow sets are detected and the full name table.

Master materialParameters and switches of M_Smith_Standard.

SettingsEvery option with its default value.

FAQAnswers to common questions.