For those who don’t know the tool: World Creator is a GPU terrain tool from BiteTheBytes with bridge plugins for Blender, Cinema 4D, Godot, Houdini, Unity, and Unreal Engine.

The big headline is a small textbox

World Creator 2026.4 lets you type mathematical expressions into numerical fields. That sounds like a nerdy feature, because it is. It also means fewer hand-calculated offsets, fewer copy-and-paste accidents, and more repeatable setups when building layered terrain that needs to stay art-directable. The same release adds full decal support. Decals are often the difference between a terrain that looks generated and one that looks dressed. They also help when you need localised detail without turning every change into another texture bake cycle.

Seams get quieter

Terrain normal blending wants to improve object-to-terrain transitions, so reduce the obvious cut line where a hero object meets the ground. If you build environments where a single rock edge can pull focus in a wide shot, this is the kind of “small” addition you end up using all day. World Creator 2026.4 also introduces configurable object shadow settings. That gives artists another lever for matching scene lighting behavior when objects sit on terrain, especially in lookdev and layout passes where readability beats physical purity.

Performance fixes that actually sound like production

VRAM scaling links the Max Object Count to available GPU VRAM. In practice, this ties a key scene limit to the hardware ceiling instead of a fixed guess, which can make scenes behave more predictably across machines.

There is another performance change that targets daily workflow friction. Shape Design Mode no longer triggers automatic material recomputes.

Bug fixes: import, UI, syncing, crashes

World Creator 2026.4 fixes an importing issue where Raw and R16 formats were hidden during import. It also corrects compass centering in the UI. On the data side, the update fixes missing Baseshape Color and Emissive toggles in the sync.xml file, resolves issues involving empty model objects, and fixes Stochastic Distribution failing when used with height blending. The release notes also state that several crashes were resolved.

Community Edition and licensing tiers

BiteTheBytes now offers a free Community Edition, positioned as a way to learn the realtime terrain workflow before upgrading to a commercial license. The export is disabled in Community Edition, while paid tiers enable export, with Indie listed as up to 8k and higher tiers listed as unlimited.

Yearly subscription pricing on the buy page lists Indie Yearly at $49 per year for revenue under $100,000, Professional Yearly at $99 per year for revenue up to $200,000, Studio Yearly at $199 per year for revenue up to $1,000,000, and Enterprise Yearly at $799 per year for revenue above $1,000,000.

Perpetual pricing includes Indie Perpetual at $99 and Professional Perpetual at $199. Enterprise Perpetual includes 12 months of updates with an optional renewal listed at $449 per year. Lifetime pricing shown includes Indie Lifetime at $249, Professional Lifetime at $499, Studio Lifetime at $999, and Enterprise Lifetime at $3,999.

https://docs.world-creator.com/release-notes/version-2026.x/world-creator-2026.4

https://www.world-creator.com

The post World Creator 2026.4 adds expressions and decals first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

For those who don’t know the tool: tamga is a quick sculpt plus vertex paint sketchpad that hands off via Wavefront OBJ to heavier DCCs like Blender when your scene stops being cute.

Small app, big get-it-done energy

tamga runs in a web browser, on desktop, and as an iPad app. The web version targets browsers with WebGPU. The iPad version requires iPadOS 26.0 or later. The design goes for minimal UI and a low friction workflow. There are no accounts, no subscriptions, and no ads stated for the tool. The tool is also described as offline by choice, with work staying on the device. This makes tamga a handy place to rough shapes, do quick paint passes, and spit out something presentable before you move to the usual monsters.

Sculpting that stays out of your way

Brushes include Clay, Smooth, Inflate, Flatten, and Drag. A modifier flips brush behavior into an alternate mode, and there is a smooth override that temporarily switches to the smooth brush at the same size. Dynamic topology is available per brush and is described as auto-splitting and simplifying as you sculpt. Remeshing rebuilds uniform topology at a chosen voxel density, and version notes mention a Close Holes button in the Remesh pop-up.

Symmetry support includes mirror sculpting across an axis, plus a symmetrize operation that applies symmetry to existing geometry. There are desktop shortcuts for undo and redo, and gesture based undo and redo on iPad.

Masks, booleans, and posing without the drama

You can paint masks to protect areas from other brushes, with an unmask action via the modifier concept. Masks also feed mesh creation. Extract Masked creates a new mesh from the masked region, and Extract Shell creates a thin shell from the mask boundary.

For fast shape bashing, there are primitives with boolean operations: union, subtract, and intersect. A smoothness slider controls how soft the boolean blend is. Positioning uses a gizmo, snapping is on by default, and a modifier disables snapping.

There is also a pose workflow built around placing anchors and dragging to deform, with options to remove anchors, freeze to bake deformation, and clear anchors. tamga comes from galata.ink, and it is a weekend project created outside professional VFX work.

Vertex paint, plus ink lines for style passes

Painting is vertex based, so paint lives on the mesh rather than in UV mapped textures. Channels listed include albedo, roughness, and metallic, with per channel toggles for painting, filling, and clearing.

Ink mode lets you draw ink like strokes on the 3D surface. View styles listed include paper mode, matcap, and PBR. Paper mode has controls such as valleys, peaks, chisel, and a mix control that blends between standard rendering and full paper mode. Render export formats listed are PNG, JPEG, and OpenEXR.

Export, pricing, and the reality check

Import and export uses Wavefront OBJ, so you can hand off to tools like Autodesk Maya or ZBrush when you need deeper pipelines. There is also export to a tamga format, plus auto recovery that saves work and restores after crashes, hopefully. Personal use is free, and personal, educational, and non profit use is free on most platforms. Commercial use requires one time payment of 12.99 USD.

A final note for people who ship frames for a living: test new tools and innovations before you rely on them in production, especially around OBJ round trips and vertex paint persistence. Do one quick scuplt, export it, reimport it, and check if the alebdo channel survives. If it does, you just bought yourself a nimble little idea machine.

https://tamga.galata.ink/

The post Galata.ink Ships Tamga Sculpt and Paint for Browsers first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

For those who don’t know the tool: Unity is a real time engine used for games, virtual production and interactive content. Polybrush was its in editor mesh and vertex painting tool. The new alternative is designed as a Unity editor extension for painting and modifying meshes directly inside the engine.

RealBlend Mesh Painting and Creation is an editor extension available via the Unity Asset Store. It is designed to provide mesh editing and painting workflows directly inside the Unity editor, reducing the need to round trip to external DCC applications for certain environment art tasks. RealBlend supports vertex painting, mesh sculpting and procedural geometry creation within Unity.

Unity deprecated PolyBrush, so I made a better one :) – Realblend
byu/AdamNapper inUnity3D

Vertex painting and layer blending

RealBlend enables vertex colour painting on meshes inside the scene view. Vertex colour painting stores colour data per vertex, allowing artists to drive shader blending, material variation or masks without additional texture maps. The tool supports multi layer blending across Unity’s render pipelines. Layer limits differ by pipeline. Up to five layers are supported in HDRP and up to three layers in URP and the Built in pipeline, according to the product description.

Sculpting and mesh editing

In addition to painting, RealBlend includes sculpting tools such as move, push and smooth. These tools operate directly on mesh geometry inside the Unity editor, allowing artists to adjust forms without exporting to modelling software. Because vertex density determines sculpting resolution, practical results will depend on mesh topology.

Procedural mesh creation

RealBlend also includes procedural mesh creation tools to generate planes, curved walls and custom surfaces procedurally. This positions the tool as more than a paint overlay system. It can be used to create base geometry and then modify or paint it in the same environment. The exact parameter controls for procedural generation are not described in detail on the Asset Store page.

Additional utilities

Along are utilities for mesh baking and a mask packer for RGBA maps. Mask packing typically combines multiple greyscale textures into different colour channels of a single texture to optimise memory usage. Procedural noise functions are also referenced for creating dirt and wear effects. These can be used to introduce variation without external texture authoring.

Pipeline compatibility and pricing

RealBlend is listed as compatible with the Built in Render Pipeline, URP and HDRP. The product is distributed through the Unity Asset Store. Pricing is 20€, currently discounted to 14.40€ (may vary by region and promotion – I don’t understand those pricing policies at all anymore, so you should consult the Asset Store listing for current pricing and licence terms. Do that HERE) No subscription requirement is indicated on the product page.

Production considerations

In editor mesh painting and sculpting can accelerate environment art iteration, particularly for blending materials, adding surface variation or shaping greybox geometry. However, tools that modify mesh data directly inside the engine should be evaluated for asset stability, version control behaviour and compatibility with existing shader setups.

As always, new tools and editor extensions should be validated in controlled conditions prior to deployment in active projects.

// https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/tools/painting/realblend-mesh-painting-creation-352952

The post RealBlend brings mesh painting back to Unity first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

For those who don’t know the tool: World Creator is a GPU-based terrain generator from BiteTheBytes used for games, VFX and previs. It exports heightfields and meshes to DCC and engine pipelines, then mostly stays out of the way.

Small release, real work

According to the official release notes, World Creator 2026.1 is a maintenance-focused update aimed at fixing long-standing usability issues rather than expanding the feature set. The developer describes the release as a refinement pass, addressing input handling, viewport behaviour, export reliability and overall application stability. No new terrain generation systems, simulation models or rendering features are introduced. This release is about making existing tools behave more predictably, especially during extended interactive sessions.

Tablet and pen support improved

A core update in 2026.1 is improved support for graphics tablets and pen displays. Stylus input now reportedly provides smoother, more predictable feedback during sculpting and editing operations. The release notes do not list specific hardware or benchmark figures. Improvements are based solely on the vendor’s claims and are Not independently verified at press time.

Viewport and navigation behaviour

This maintenance update also adjusts viewport focus and camera navigation. Terrain now centres more reliably in the viewport, reducing navigation offsets on large landscapes. These changes target everyday interaction more than output quality.

New Smooth filter

A dedicated Smooth filter has been introduced to remove high-frequency noise from heightfields and meshes. The notes describe it as complementary to existing erosion and sediment filters. Technical details such as algorithm type or whether it uses GPU acceleration are not disclosed and remain Not independently verified at press time.

Stability and workflow fixes

The build includes numerous bug fixes addressing crashes, export issues, image border artefacts, EXR import edge cases and sculpt layer errors. While not headline features, these fixes support more reliable production use.

Pricing and licensing structure

World Creator offers both rental (subscription) and perpetual licences with multiple tiers:

Rental (annual)

• Indie: ~USD 99/year, entry level with limitations and revenue cap.
• Professional: ~USD 199/year, full feature access with no revenue cap.
• Studio: ~USD 249/year, additional support and studio-focused terms.
• Enterprise: ~USD 1,289.88/year, priority support and advanced commercial terms.

Perpetual (one-time)

• Indie: ~USD 149 one-time purchase.
• Professional: ~USD 249.
• Studio: ~USD 499.
• Enterprise: ~USD 1,669.

These price ranges are based on official licence listings. Perpetual licences include 12 months of updates and support, after which optional maintenance plans can be renewed at additional cost. Prices do not include VAT and may vary by region.

Integration and availability

World Creator 2026.1 is available for Windows 10+. Integration plugins exist for Blender, Cinema 4D, Godot, Houdini, Unity and Unreal Engine. Export formats include OBJ, FBX, glTF and texture maps.

What is not changed

This release does not introduce new procedural systems, biome layers, simulation features or expanded export formats. Feature enhancements are refinements rather than additions. As always, studios should test updates on representative scenes before deploying in active production: verification beats release notes.

The post World Creator 2026.1 polishes the boring bits first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

A Quarter-Century of Digital Clay

The ZBrush Summit 2025 Virtual Edition runs from 7 to 9 November 2025, celebrating 25 years of ZBrush. Hosted by Maxon, the event streams globally via ZBrush Live, Twitch and YouTube. It marks a dual milestone: a decade of the live Sculpt-Off competition and a quarter-century of the digital sculpting software that reshaped 3D character creation across film, games and design.

The online format, introduced during the pandemic years, remains. No travel, no queues — only three days of streamed presentations, artist showcases and production-level tips.

Friday: Legends Return to the Arena

The Summit opens with the Past Competitors LIVE ZBrush Sculpt-Off. Over fifty artists from the competition’s first decade, including Maarten Verhoeven, Zhelong Xu, Ashley Adams and Christian Carranza, have been invited back for a three-hour speed-sculpt challenge.

That’s followed by the Public LIVE Sculpt-Off, an open competition judged on creativity and execution under time pressure. Both contests reinforce what has become the Summit’s defining spectacle: sculptors creating original work live, in front of a global audience.

Saturday: Practice, Process and Production

Day Two runs from 9:00 to 18:00 PST, starting with Robson Barros from Loot Studios discussing Creating 3D Printable Miniatures That Tell Stories. His live ZBrush demo focuses on scale readability, pose design and physical durability for tabletop models.

Ryan Kingslien, who helped define early ZBrush anatomy training, revisits Beyond Reference, a session on form interpretation and sculptural anatomy. Daniel Hahn (Daytoner) then offers a production-focused look at hard-surface workflows used in toy and concept model creation.

Marko Lazov follows with live creature design improvisation under Turning Chaos Into Creatures. Przemyslaw Malachowski demonstrates Designing Tattoos in 3D, showing how sculpting tools can map artwork precisely to body anatomy.

The evening concludes with WeFX detailing ZBrush use on Wednesday Season 2 for Netflix. Team members Brandon Golding, Carlos Jacinto, Cesar Dacol Jr, Mauro Matheus and Sam Javanrouh break down their creature and prop work before the traditional “Good-Byes” close the stream.

Sunday: Studios, Toys and Technical Futures

The final day begins with Jordi Cerdà Gaya presenting 15 Years Using ZBrush and Crafting 3D Models by Natural Intelligence, a reflection on freelance product modelling and digital craftsmanship.

A highlight session follows from ID Software (Denzil O’Neill, Jason Martin and Solomon Gaitan) showing how ZBrush contributed to asset creation for Doom The Dark Ages.

Matt Hilton from Hasbro takes the stage for Making Joe, revealing the sculpt-to-production process for the G.I. Joe Classified Series. Mitchel Wu then reframes digital sculpting from a photographer’s perspective in The Second Life of a Subtool, tracing the journey from ZBrush mesh to practical miniature sets.

Later segments include Patrick 4D’s short presentation, followed by the Maxon Development Team previewing upcoming features and a 2026 roadmap. Details of these “exciting features” were not yet disclosed at press time.

The Summit concludes with the LIVE Sculpt-Off Winners Announcement, crowning champions from both the public and invitational events before a final farewell.

Looking Back – and Ahead

First released in 1999, ZBrush has become a cornerstone of digital production pipelines and earned a 2014 Scientific and Engineering Award from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for its multi-resolution sculpting system. The 25th anniversary Summit blends that heritage with a forward look. For production artists, the sessions promise practical insights across sculpting, concept art, collectibles, and VFX asset creation.

Maxon – ZBrush Summit 2025 Virtual Edition

The post Sculpt-Offs, Anniversaries & Anatomy: ZBrush Summit 2025 celebrates 25 years first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.