CGpainter Documentation
Help for CGpainter — a GPU texture painter for 3D models. Browse the topics below, or use the bar at the top.
Tip: press F1 any time to open this documentation.
Getting started
- Introduction — what CGpainter is + key concepts.
- Interface overview — viewports, tool rail, panels.
- Quick-start tutorial — import → paint → bake → export.
Projects & meshes
- New project & importing a mesh — dialog, templates, formats, UVs, high-poly.
- Texture sets & channels — PBR channels, resolution.
- Saving & loading — the
.cgpproject file.
Navigating
- Camera controls & view modes — orbit / pan / zoom, perspective/ortho, channel & baked-map views.
Painting
- Tools — Brush, Eraser, Fill, Smudge, Blend, Gradient, Eyedropper.
- Brush settings & channels — size, hardness, opacity, flow, spacing, scatter, colour.
- Dynamics, stabilizer & smooth — pressure, sensors, curves.
- Stamps & alphas — brush shapes and imported alphas.
- Mirror & stencil — paint modifiers.
Layers
- Working with layers — paint / fill / folder, blend modes, per-channel control, reorder & merge.
Masks & generators
- Mask basics — black/white masks and the mask stack.
- Generators — curvature wear, AO cavity, thickness, slope, and more.
- Filters — levels, blur, sharpen, HSL.
Smart materials & the Shelf
- The Shelf — the asset library: alphas, bakes, images, smart materials.
- Smart materials — capture, apply, and manage reusable layer stacks.
- Importing textures — use an image as a paint / fill / mask source.
Baking
- Baking mesh maps — Normal, AO, Curvature, Thickness, per-map anti-aliasing.
Selection
- Selecting regions — brush / lasso / polyline / rectangle, 2D view, selection → mask.
External editing
- Round-trip to Photoshop / Krita — send the view out, edit, and apply it back.
Live link to Blender
- CGlivelink — paint in CGpainter and see the material update live on your model in Blender; install the add-on, connect, Send / Update.
Exporting
- Exporting textures — presets, channel packing, formats, resolution, bit depth.
Reference
- Keyboard shortcuts & gestures
- Glossary — PBR terms.
- Troubleshooting