InstaMat did include a demonstration at yesterday’s live stream that showed the paintbrushes and the tools used to create and customize them. I am not that familiar with nodes but this new software inspired me to learn about them. Will be great to have an alternative to the existing hand-painting apps. I think InstaMat is a winner.
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Managed to get mine!
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Watched a bit of the live stream at the time and asked a couple of questions before it just got too late and I needed to get some sleep.
It all looked very interesting and promising, very much like full Designer had been put inside Painter. Not had a chance to download yet, but I will.
The InstaLOD guys know what they’re doing and all I’ve seen so far from InstaMAT looks amazing.
Just one question:
Linux?
Same! From what I see on youtube it looks great. Not sure when I get a chance to try it myself (very busy) but I’m looking forward to testing this.
The usual stuff…
Compatible with MacOS and PC
( actually my graphiccards aren’t powerfull enough anyway… so back to Material maker 
)
I remember reading somewhere at one point they hoped to do a Linux version as well, but it would only be Windows and Mac on initial release.
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InstaLOD is Win / Mac only. So I don’t have high hopes.
I also remember when Quixel Mixer surfaced. They also promised a Linux version.
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A few red flags that may be worth considering before getting this:
- Their site has no privacy policy
- Their site has no cookie policy, including no GDPR-compliant cookie rejection options
- The free license explicitly collects your data and uses it for monetization (it says it in the features section, as if that’s somehow a feature???)
- The vast majority of their forms do not work
- They do not reply to Contact Us submissions
- You have to create an account with a third party website, that has all of the above issues (no privacy policy, no GDPR compliance, forms don’t work, etc)
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I had the usual cookie ‘OK’ option pop up along the bottom of the web page I just looked at. Much the same as every other web site these days.
Said pop-up from above, had this link: https://theabstract.co/privacypolicy/
Let’s dig a little deeper, though, since this a great example case for why hype trains are usually worth investigating:
Their domain was registered through WordPress, but recently (last April) transferred to… someone? else, who refuses to disclose any information:
Let’s look at their parent company:
Registered through NameCheap, which is a notoriously sketchy domain registrar…
Let’s look at the Terms of Use of Abstract, the parent company… one thing immediately stands out:
Agreement
The company reserves the right to assign or transfer our rights and obligations under this Agreement in whole or in part without your consent to an affiliate, or in connection with a merger, acquisition, corporate restructure or reorganization, or due to the sale of all or substantially all of our assets.
This isn’t normal ToS boilerplate- it’s clear that this company plans on being acquired by a larger company. Wonder why they would offer a free license (with unlimited data collection) if they’re planning on selling the company later? It’s almost like data is the most valuable currency on the Internet and a large database of user data will massively increase their valuation 
@thetony20 their privacy policy isn’t at all correct or legal, as it’s for an entirely different website.
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Yeah, I wouldn’t count on it till it actually happens. My guess is it will come down to how well initial Windows/Mac does and more likely how much larger studios say they need a Linux version or its a no go.
I think Designer/Painter works on Linux for enterprise license, so if they want the big boys to jump on board, they may not have much choice.
Same company tho, isn’t it?
Compared to say the guys behind Designer/Painter, which never said they where just waiting to be bought up and bam, hello Adobe.
Or how about Zbrush…
I mean sure, it may not look the best, but frankly, have a close look at any ToS (your ISP, Windows OS (Microsoft), Youtube, likely even this website and if you dig deep and consider all the things it may or may not allow to happen, one wouldn’t use anything.
big thanks for looking deeper into that!
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Someone asked them in the comments of one of their videos and they answered that they already have a working version running on RHEL and they are planning to release something this year.
Let’s see if they actually can deliver.
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This is weird because it is a German company. This stuff is very strictly enforced in the EU.
Regarding the program itself, the only experience I have dealing with this company is from a few years back on the InstaLOD beta. It was not a good experience. The feedback relationship was terrible and the program itself was not at all what it was marketed as. It simply didn’t perform half as well as I had been led to believe.
As for InstaMAT, I wonder what viewport renderer/shading model it uses because the examples they show in that stream look very underwhelming visually. They look more like old-school spec/diffuse assets rather than 2024 PBR.
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That’s not at all surprising, information about Abstract is sadly quite scarce but I can’t drum up any compelling evidence that this is any more than a single-person operation. I wouldn’t claim to be able to analyze website code without access to the actual backend with impunity or even with any accuracy, but both sites have similar and disturbing issues. For example- /wp-admin should never be publicly accessible, and yet, it is… also it’s a wordpress.com panel, not wordpress.org, which means they’re using the free version of WordPress- not a great sign generally, and definitely not a great sign for their financials
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I guess we could give them props for being honest and up front about that, at least.
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Ireland is the European headquarters of many of the U.S tech and Pharma giants. All of these huge ‘data collection centres’ have accompanied this. They are monstrous, bizarre buildings with no signage or windows and huge empty car parks. These data centres are responsible for 30% of the usage of the entire electrical grid of Ireland. I find the whole thing obscene.
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There’s just… so much, the more you dig… their SSL certificate is a free one from Let’s Encrypt, they’re using Bootstrap 3.3 (https://instamaterial.com/wp-content/themes/InstaMAT_theme_20240118/assets/js/bootstrap.min.js?ver=1.1), which is horrifically out of date, they’re using Jquery 1.1 (horrifically out of date again), all their libraries are out of date and riddled with vulnerabilities, they have three separate tracking scripts installed on their site, and so on and so on. Guys, I’m begging you to do some basic research before signing up for this 
I could take this site down or inject malicious code into it in about ten minutes
ETA: Their user information and authentication API returns information to the public internet with a simple GET query. Using these sites or this software is a massive security risk!!!