User Guide Cancel

Maya Scripting | Ecosystem and Plug-ins

  1. Substance 3D home
  2. Ecosystems and Plugins
    1. Home
    2. Game Engines
      1. Unreal Engine
        1. Unreal Engine 5
          1. Unreal Engine 5 overview
          2. Unreal Engine 5 Release Notes
            1. Unreal plugin 5.3.2
            2. Unreal plugin 5.0.3
            3. Unreal plugin 5.0.2
            4. Unreal plugin 5.0.1
          3. Plugin Overview - UE5
          4. Plugin Settings - UE5
          5. Substance Input Image - UE5
          6. Material Instance Definition - UE5
          7. Material Template Usage - UE5
          8. Out-of-the-Box Material Templates
          9. Tiling Substance - UE5
          10. Substance 3D Plugin Default Templates
          11. Substance 3D Assets Library Usage - UE5
          12. Blueprints - UE5
            1. Blueprint(UE5): Substance material parameters
            2. Blueprint(UE5): Dynamic Material Instance Skip to end of metadata
            3. Blueprint(UE5): Aggregate Substance
            4. Blueprint(UE5): Node Reference
          13. Unreal Engine 5 Scripting
          14. Installing to Source Builds
        2. Unreal Engine 4
          1. Unreal Engine 4 overview
          2. Unreal Engine 4 plugin release notes
            1. Unreal plugin 4.27.0.1
            2. Unreal plugin 4.26.0.21
            3. Unreal plugin 4.26.0.2
            4. Unreal plugin 4.26.0.1
            5. Unreal plugin 4.25.0.5
            6. Unreal plugin 4.25.0.4
            7. Unreal plugin 4.25.0.3
            8. Unreal plugin 4.24.0.3
            9. Unreal plugin 4.23.0.2
            10. Unreal plugin 4.23.0.1
            11. Unreal plugin 4.22.0.33
            12. Unreal plugin 4.22.0.32
            13. Unreal plugin 4.21.0.31
          3. Plugin Overview - UE4
          4. Plugin Settings - UE4
          5. Substance Input Image - UE4
          6. Material Instance Definition - UE4
          7. Tiling Substance - UE4
          8. Working with Bump Offset (Parallax) - UE4
          9. Working with Displacement - UE4
          10. Source in UE4
          11. Live Link in UE4
          12. Blueprints - UE4
            1. Blueprint(UE4): Substance material parameters
            2. Blueprint(UE4): Dynamic Material Instance
            3. Blueprint(UE4): Aggregate Substance
            4. Blueprint(UE4): Node Reference
          13. Unreal Engine 4 Scripting
      2. Unity
        1. Unity overview
        2. Unity Release Notes
          1. Unity 3.0.0+
          2. Unity 2.6.0
          3. Unity 2.5.4
          4. Unity 2.5.3
          5. Unity 2.5.2
          6. Unity 2.5.1
          7. Unity 2.4.5
          8. Unity 2.4.4
          9. Unity 2.4.3
          10. Unity 2.4.1
          11. Unity 2.4.0
          12. Unity 2.3.4
          13. Unity 2.3.2
          14. Unity 2.2.2
          15. Unity 2.2.0
        3. Downloading Substance 3D Plugin in Unity
        4. Unity Plugin Overview
        5. Unity Preferences
        6. Optimization Guidelines
        7. Upgrading Projects/Known Issues
        8. Managing Substance Graphs
        9. Changing parameters
        10. Generated Textures (Packing)
        11. Rendering Color Space
        12. Using Image Inputs
        13. Publishing for Mobile
        14. Substance 3D for Unity Scripting
          1. Unity Scripting overview
          2. Class Documentation
            1. SubstanceEditorTools
            2. SubstanceRuntime Class
            3. SubstanceRuntimeGraph Class
              1. SubstanceRuntimeGraph Class overview
              2. Member Function Documentation
              3. Detailed Description
        15. Scripting in Unity (Deprecated)
        16. API Overview
        17. Scripting API
        18. C# Example Script
        19. Substance 3D Assets Library Usage
        20. Removing Substance Plugin
        21. Substance 3D in Unity Tutorials
        22. Physical Size in Unity
        23. Sharing sbsar Files Between Projects
      3. Lumberyard
        1. Lumberyard overview
        2. Importing a Substance
        3. Assigning a Substance
        4. Parameters and outputs
        5. Flow Graph API
      4. Roblox
    3. 3D Applications
      1. Maya
        1. Maya Plugin Release Notes
          1. Maya 3.0.0+
          2. Maya 2.4.1
          3. Maya 2.4.0
          4. Maya 2.3
          5. Maya 2.2.3
          6. Maya 2.2.2
          7. Maya 2.2.1
          8. Maya 2.1.9
          9. Maya 2.1.8
          10. Maya 2.1.7
          11. Maya 2.1.6
          12. Maya 2.1.5
          13. Maya 2.1.4
          14. Maya 2.1.3
          15. Maya 2.1.2
          16. Maya 2.1.1
          17. Maya 2.1.0
          18. Maya 2.0.3
          19. Maya 0.9.11
        2. Substance in Maya Overview
        3. Installation
        4. Substance Output Node
        5. Using Workflows
        6. Working with Outputs
        7. Procedural Sampling
        8. Presets
        9. Settings
        10. Arnold Support
        11. Apply Workflow To Maps
        12. Maya Scripting
        13. Physical Size in Maya
      2. 3ds Max
        1. 3ds Max Plugin Release Notes
          1. 3ds Max 3.0.0+
          2. 3ds Max 2.8.0
          3. 3ds Max 2.7.0
          4. 3ds Max 2.4.2
          5. 3ds Max 2.4.1
          6. 3ds Max 2.4.0
          7. 3ds Max 2.3.4
          8. 3ds Max 2.3.3
          9. 3ds Max 2.3.2
          10. 3ds Max 2.3.1
          11. 3ds Max 2.2.0
        2. Substance in 3ds Max Overview
        3. Substance Settings
        4. Using Presets
        5. Batch Import
        6. Using Workflows in 3ds Max
        7. Substance Source
        8. Animating a Substance material
        9. 3ds MAX Scripting API
        10. Troubleshooting
      3. MODO
        1. MODO overview
        2. Modo Plugin Release Notes
          1. Modo 2.7.3
          2. Modo v. 2.7.5
          3. Modo v. 2.7.4
          4. Modo v. 2.7.3
          5. Modo v. 2.7.2
          6. Modo v. 2.7.1
          7. Modo v. 2.7.0
        3. Substance in MODO Overview
        4. Modo Installation
        5. Parameters
        6. Custom Materials
        7. Working with Normals
        8. Working with Emissive
        9. Bump and Displacement
        10. Working with References
        11. Animating Substances
        12. Copy/Duplicate Substance
        13. Environment and Rendering Setup
        14. Modo Switch Engine
        15. Tiling Modo textures
      4. Cinema 4D
        1. Cinema 4D overview
        2. Set-Up
        3. Using the Substance Plugin
        4. Substance Asset Manager
        5. Substance Shader
        6. Attribute Manager
        7. Visual Feedback of Animated Substances
      5. Houdini
      6. Blender
        1. Blender overview
        2. Release Notes
          1. Add-on 2.0.0+
          2. Add-on 1.0.2
          3. Add-on 0.9.5
          4. Add-on 0.9.3
          5. Add-on 0.9.2
          6. Add-on 0.9.1
        3. Substance in Blender Overview
        4. Downloading and Installing the Plugin
        5. Preferences
        6. The Substance 3D Panel
        7. Shortcuts and Navigation
        8. Workflows
        9. Physical size in Blender
        10. Substance 3D Assets Library
        11. Troubleshooting
        12. Uninstalling the Add-on
        13. Substance 3D Add-on for Blender Tutorials
    4. Creative Cloud Applications
      1. Photoshop
    5. Renderers
      1. Converting Substance outputs
      2. Color Management
        1. Color Management overview
        2. Substance textures in Maya
        3. Substance textures in 3ds Max
      3. Arnold
        1. Arnold overview
        2. Arnold - Substance in 3ds Max
        3. Arnold - Substance in Maya
        4. Arnold - Substance Painter
      4. Vray
        1. Vray overview
        2. Vray Next - Substance in Maya
        3. Vray Next - Substance in 3ds Max
        4. Vray Next - Substance Painter
      5. Renderman
        1. Renderman overview
        2. Renderman for Maya
        3. Renderman - Substance Painter
      6. Redshift
        1. Redshift overview
        2. Redshift for 3ds Max
        3. Redshift for Maya
        4. Redshift - Substance Painter
      7. Maxwell
        1. Maxwell overview
        2. Maxwell - Substance in Maya
        3. Maxwell - Substance Painter
      8. Corona
        1. Corona overview
        2. Corona for 3ds Max
        3. Corona - Substance Painter
      9. Octane
        1. Octane overview
        2. Octane for 3ds Max
        3. Octane for MODO
      10. Keyshot
      11. Thea
      12. Maverick
        1. Maverick overview
        2. Substance Painter Integration
        3. Substance SBSAR Integration
      13. Toolbag
      14. Cycles and Eevee
        1. Cycles and Eevee overview
        2. Cycles and Eevee - Substance 3D for Blender
        3. Cycles and Eevee - Susbtance Painter
    6. Partnerships
      1. Substance 3D and Maxon One
      2. Substance 3D and Maxon One FAQ

Maya Scripting

The Substance in Maya plugin can be scripted. An exposed API allows Substance commands to be used in scripts for creating and managing Substance materials. You can access the available commands by going to the plugin information.

Windows>Settings/Preferences/Plugin Manager and search for the substancemaya.mll file.

Click the "i" button to see the available commands

Example Script:

This script will load an sbsar file and apply the Arnold render workflow to the selected mesh. To use the script, please follow the example listed here. 

  1. copy and paste the code into a Python tab of the script editor.
  2. Select and mesh in the viewport
  3. Select the text in the Python tab and hit "ctrl + enter" 
  4. In the window, browse for an sbsar file. 

import maya.cmds as cmds 
 
def _connect_place2d(substance_node): 
    """ Connects the place2d texture node to the Substance node """ 
    place_node = cmds.shadingNode('place2dTexture', asUtility=True) 
 
    connect_attrs = [('outUV', 'uvCoord'), ('outUvFilterSize', 'uvFilterSize')] 
 
    for out_attr, in_attr in connect_attrs: 
        cmds.connectAttr('{}.{}'.format(place_node, out_attr), 
                         '{}.{}'.format(substance_node, in_attr)) 
 
def _find_shading_group(node): 
    """ Walks the shader graph to find the shading group """ 
    result = None 
 
    connections = cmds.listConnections(node, source=False) 
 
    if connections: 
        for connection in connections: 
            if cmds.nodeType(connection) == 'shadingEngine': 
                result = connection 
            else: 
                result = _find_shading_group(connection) 
                if result is not None: 
                    break 
 
    return result 
 
def _apply_substance_workflow_to_selected(substance_file, workflow): 
    """ Imports a mesh into Maya and applies the shader from a 
        Substance workflow to it """ 
    geometry = cmds.ls(geometry=True) 
 
    # Create the substance node and connect the place2d texture node 
    substance_node = cmds.shadingNode('substanceNode', asTexture=True) 
    _connect_place2d(substance_node) 
 
    # Load the Substance file 
    cmds.substanceNodeLoadSubstance(substance_node, substance_file) 
 
    # Apply the workflow 
    cmds.substanceNodeApplyWorkflow(substance_node, workflow=workflow) 
 
    # Acquire the shading group and apply it to the mesh 
    shading_group = _find_shading_group(substance_node) 
 
    cmds.select(geometry) 
    cmds.hyperShade(assign=shading_group) 
 
def demo_load_sbsar_workflow(): 
    """ Acquires an sbsar from a file dialog, loading and applying it to 
        any selected mesh """ 
    file_filter = 'Substance (*.sbsar);;' 
 
    files = cmds.fileDialog2(cap='Select a Substance file', fm=1, dialogStyle=2, 
                             okc='Open', fileFilter=file_filter) 
 
    if files: 
        substance_file = files[0] 
        _apply_substance_workflow_to_selected(substance_file, 
                                              cmds.substanceGetWorkflow()) 
 
if __name__ == '__main__': 
    demo_load_sbsar_workflow()

An exposed API allows Substance commands to be used in scripts

Get help faster and easier

New user?