Material Maker vs Wafer

Material Maker is an open-source tool for authoring procedural PBR materials with node graphs and exporting them for game engines and movie assets. It supports static and dynamic PBR, raymarching, and dynamic unlit materials. The official site lists more than 200 nodes; users can create nodes by combining existing ones or describing them in GLSL. Materials can be exported for Godot, Unity, and Unreal Engine. Unreal requires extra steps: Unreal Engine 4 needs manual material setup, while Unreal Engine 5 uses a generated Python script that must be run in Unreal. The tool provides 2D and 3D previews, image and spritesheet export, and loading of custom OBJ models. An experimental procedural-brush feature can texture 3D models. A website library offers community materials, nodes, brushes, and environments. Material Maker runs on Linux, macOS, and Windows. It is free through Itch.io, with a Steam plan at $14.99 as a one-time purchase. Its code uses the MIT License and assets use Creative Commons Zero 1.0 Universal.

Wafer is 3D texture painting software for stylized, hand-painted, and NPR assets. Its drawing tools—including brushes, lasso clips, gradients, wet painting, and blur—work directly on 3D geometry. A non-destructive layer system includes paint and fill layers, editable masks, blend modes, and opacity controls. Artists can use 2D or 3D symmetry with independently configurable pivots, paint across multiple PBR channels, or define custom channel layouts for stylized shaders. Projects can contain multiple meshes, materials, and texture sets, with configurable channel packing for export. An integrated asset browser includes stencils, triplanar textures, brush alphas, HDRIs, decals, and stamps. The desktop download is free to try, but saving documents and exporting textures require a purchase. Indie costs $45, paid once; Studio and Studio (Floating) each cost $120 as a one-time purchase. Each listed plan includes one year of updates. Desktop purchases apply only to the listed Windows and macOS versions and are not compatible with the Apple App Store or other platforms.