Material Assistant (Director)

Describe the material you want, then refine it in Blender. Material Director can build painted metal, wood, fabric, rubber, stone and other surfaces from editable layers, masks and generated textures. Ask for a new material, adjust a specific detail or coordinate the materials across an asset. The result stays in the normal Open Painter stack.

Set up the Assistant

Material Director connects through your ChatGPT/Codex account and uses online access. Open Painter handles the connection setup when you sign in. Core painting and materials work offline.

1. Select a texture set with an assigned, UV-unwrapped mesh and open the Assistant sidebar tab.
2. Enable Preferences › System › Allow Online Access in Blender.
3. Click Sign in with ChatGPT and complete sign-in in your browser. The panel shows setup progress, available models and your account's reported usage allowance.
4. Enable Share Material Context with Codex before sending your first instruction. Use What is sent to see the material information and images included in a request.

In add-on preferences, choose OS Keyring to remember your login or This Connection Only for the current session. Reconnect after changing account storage.

Prepare the mesh maps

Before using Create, Refine or Plan, bake AO, Curvature, Normal, World Normal, Position and Thickness for each texture set you will include. Keep Send Current 3D View and Send Mesh Maps enabled so the Assistant can place wear and surface detail on the model. The panel names any maps that need baking or refreshing. Explain can discuss your material before this setup is complete.

Choose a workflow

Choose Texture Set for the active material, Selected Layer / Folder for focused edits, or Scene Materials to coordinate up to 16 assigned materials. For example, give a machine matching painted panels, worn rubber grips and greasy metal fittings in one instruction.

Describe the finish and where it belongs

Name the material, its finish and how it has been used. For a refinement, say which detail should change and which parts should stay as they are.

• “Create dark green painted steel with irregular edge wear and a little rust in the recesses.”
• “Reduce the existing rust, preserve its pattern, and make the bottom dirtier.”
• “Add a roughness-only fingerprint layer around the handle.”
• “Dry the existing mud without moving it.”
• “The scratches look too uniform. Explain what to change.”

Frame the asset in Material Preview or Rendered shading so the surface is easy to read. Add a Reference Image for a particular finish or color palette. For a specific part, use a face selection, vertex group or named attribute to identify the region.

Follow-up instructions use the recent conversation and current material. You can ask Explain to identify a problem, then use Refine to fix it. The conversation lasts for the current session; the authored material saves with the project.

Follow an instruction

The progress panel shows elapsed time, the current step and recent activity, such as generating a texture or rendering a candidate in Eevee. Show Full Log opens the complete record. The Painter header also shows progress while you work in another sidebar tab.

Use Stop to cancel a request. Create and Refine apply the completed material change as one Blender undo step. In Plan mode, use Show Changes to review the draft before applying it.

Generate surface textures

Leave Generate Surface Textures enabled for image-based grain, stains, chipped paint and other surface detail. Try: “Generate dark olive enamel and an irregular chipped-paint mask, with separate exposed steel and cavity rust layers.”

Generated images become channel textures or grayscale masks with the usual projection, scale, levels, filters and opacity controls. They are packed into the .blend, so you can keep editing, save and export the material after disconnecting. Color textures use sRGB; roughness, height and masks use Non-Color data.

Fit detail to the model

For a material that follows the whole object, the Assistant captures views of the surface and its mesh maps, generates appearance for those views and combines the result in the existing UV layout. It can inspect coverage and capture additional views for areas that need more detail. Regional artwork can use a projected fill with editable depth and a mask.

Existing generated color can guide matching roughness, metallic and height maps while keeping the same placement. Ask for changes to color, roughness, scale or coverage separately. Use height for raised or recessed detail; keep flat printed marks in color and roughness channels. Height also contributes to the exported normal map.

For dimensioned details, set the texture set's physical size first. This gives requests such as millimeter-wide scratches a useful scale.

Review the material on the asset

Review Candidate Appearance lets the Assistant render its proposal in Eevee, inspect several sides and closeups, and make corrections before applying it. Generated surface work uses this review to check placement and appearance together.

Local corrections can target a source region while keeping surrounding detail. For a broader revision, ask to change the finish across the material. After applying, every layer and mask remains available in the Inspector and Open Graph.

Keep control of your edits

Paint layers and painted or stroke masks are protected automatically. Use Protected Content to lock another layer, channel or mask; protecting a folder includes its children. This is useful for keeping hand-painted marks while refining the surrounding material.

Show Changes lists what a draft will change or what the latest completed instruction changed. Ctrl+Z follows Blender's undo history. Undo Last AI Change reverses the latest Assistant change while keeping later manual edits where they conflict.

If you change the material while a draft is being prepared, send a new instruction so it uses your latest edits. Use Apply Draft once you are happy with a plan.

Editable material tools

The Assistant works with fill layers, folders, channel values and images, procedural sources, masks, scene fields, filters and anchors. It can also insert bundled materials, effects and module recipes. Use Blender's modeling and UV tools to prepare the asset, and Open Painter's Bake and Export panels for the final maps and delivery.

Choose what to share

Material context includes the layer structure, controls, object names, dimensions and available maps. View sharing adds material views; map sharing adds mesh-map previews. A reference image is included when you select one. Check What is sent before running an instruction. The full mesh and .blend stay on your computer, and your login is stored separately from the project.