Today Adobe announced the acquisition of Allegorithmic, the makers of the popular Substance Designer and Substance Painter PBR based texturing tools. Given Adobe’s track record with acquiring other companies (Mixamo and Macromedia spring immediately to mind), the community is admittedly a bit nervous about this development, as you can see from their forums.
Details from the Allegorithmic announcement:
Today marks a milestone for Allegorithmic and the Substance community: Allegorithmic is joining the Adobe family, where we’ll continue to lead the way in empowering 3D creation.
Since the inception of Substance, our technology and tools have evolved to make 3D creation accessible to artists of every stripe. In Adobe, we’ve found a great partner who shares our love of creation and our drive for innovation and growth.
The Substance tools and ecosystem you love are here to stay – and flourish!
“This wild and thrilling ride began 15 years ago.”
You’ll be seeing Substance and Adobe’s tools evolve together within the coming months and years, but the very same teams are still behind your favorite products, and you can still find us in your favorite online Substance communities, which are growing every day.
When it comes to licensing, nothing changes for now. Your current licenses will continue running and getting updates. As we join the Adobe family, we will also unveil new and more flexible subscription offers in the coming months. We will share more details about these new and exciting licensing options at a later date.
Adobe have also released a statement:
Our goal with Creative Cloud is to provide creators with all the tools they need for whatever story they choose to tell. Increasingly, stories are being told with 3D content. That’s why I’m excited to announce that today Adobe has acquired Allegorithmic, the industry standard in tools for 3D material and texture creation for gaming and entertainment.
The addition of Allegorithmic furthers our expansion of Creative Cloud into 3D content design. A little over a year ago, we introduced Adobe Dimension, which allows creatives to compose and render three-dimensional product mockups, packaging designs, and more. This fall, we previewed Project Aero, a powerful augmented reality authoring tool that takes much of the technical complexity out of creating immersive experiences.
With this acquisition, Creative Cloud will benefit from Allegorithmic tools that are already helping top gaming, entertainment, retail, and other brands create the textures and materials that give 3D content detail and realism. Allegorithmic’s Substance family of tools are used in the vast majority of AAA games, including Call of Duty, Assassin’s Creed, and Forza. They’re increasingly being used for visual effects and animation in entertainment, including in award-winning, popular movies like Blade Runner 2049, Pacific Rim Uprising, and Tomb Raider. And they’re being adopted in the fields of design, product visualization, retail and marketing, architecture, and manufacturing, where 3D content is transforming traditional workflows into fully digital ones.
If you want your non-subscription Substance license, better move quickly!