Merging Materials in Unreal Engine EXPLAINED!!

[@slumsnake1303]

Incredibly useful tutorial. I had a blueprint that had about 5 hundred materials and I wanted to convert it to a static mesh, but when I did it the other way, the materials got mixed up. However, when I used this tool, which I had never known about before, I not only created a static mesh instead of a blueprint, but I also combined all the same materials into one slot!

[@HojDee]

@@slumsnake1303 glad it helped you man :) that's a lot of optimization!

[@3darchstuffs]

Great tutorial. Keep it up my dear friend.

[@HojDee]

@@3darchstuffs thanks man! I appreciate it :)

[@DrLowPol]

thanks for tutorial. but i have 1 problem with it, when i'm trying to merge 4 objects with 1 material per mesh, for some reason that tool duplicates textures in final atlas and instead of 2x2 atlas i'm getting 4x4 with duplicated textures. how can i fix that?

[@krzysztofbogdanowicz4543]

Super knowledge ! Thank you !

[@HojDee]

You're welcome :)

[@Tescclass]

thank you this is so useful
I wonder what is the best performance between using 1 material for 100 actors or 100 material for 100 actors?

[@HojDee]

1 material is always better. Material instances are cheap. Soif you want variationa, always use material instances

[@AndronCollider]

THANKS A LOT!!! i wld never find how to export textures after merge

[@HojDee]

@@AndronCollider glad it helped :)

[@benmoseley5178]

How do you preserve the UVs? When i use merge materials option it creates new UVs. Thanks for the vid

[@HojDee]

When merging materials, a new texture should be created. And that texture needs a new UV. That's why the previous UV can't be preserved. That's what I think is the reason.

[@MUHAMMADDANISHBINZOLKEFLE]

@@HojDee HOwever the texture resolution seems low. Is there a way to fix this?

[@HojDee]

@@MUHAMMADDANISHBINZOLKEFLE yeah, there's a texture size option. Setit to a higher value

[@driizzlingrain6778]

good one 👏

[@HojDee]

Thanks :)

[@SchmirkoOff]

Good tutorial, but if I change the LOD Selection Type to "Use specific LOD Level", the "Merge Materials"-option still is disabled. Do you have any idea why it isn't enabled after that? Did I forget sth?

[@HojDee]

Hi! if you do it like the video, it should be enabled....maybe there's sth wrong with the mesh

[@SchmirkoOff]

@@HojDee Thanks for answering, however the mesh is nothing special. But I've got the theories now in the meantime, that it's either because all those Materials are in fact Material Instances or it's too much of them on the mesh (89).

[@HojDee]

@@SchmirkoOff send me the mesh, i'll check it later

[@NeutronReviews]

Under the LOD Select Type section you need to select the "Always use the lowest-detail LOD" and it should work.

[@SchmirkoOff]

@@NeutronReviews Thank you, I will try it by chance^^

[@YOGESHKUMAR-ry1fz]

nice this is good info

[@HojDee]

I'm glad you find it helpful :)

[@miccallwang3164]

merge materials only available when using lowest LOD , but why ?

[@HojDee]

@@miccallwang3164 not just the lowest. You should select a specific lod level. It can be lod 0, 1 or any other one of them

[@miccallwang3164]

@@HojDee 😭 not working for me

[@miccallwang3164]

@@HojDee I see the script :
/** Whether to merge source materials into one flat material, ONLY available when LOD Selection Type is set to LowestDetailLOD */
UPROPERTY(EditAnywhere, BlueprintReadWrite, Category = MaterialSettings, meta=(EditCondition="LODSelectionType == EMeshLODSelectionType::LowestDetailLOD"))
its must be LowestDetailLOD selecrted

[@Nilsser]

Interesting also. I don't know why but it's not working in Unreal Egnien 5.2. It just creates a new merged material that has does not align with the mesh also the previous materials are all still there.

[@HojDee]

@@Nilsser really? It works for me though. Haveyou tried it in 5.4? Or any other version

[@Nilsser]

@@HojDee We can’t switch engine at this point quite as fast. It basically creates a mesh with all the previous materials and then a merged mat that does not seem to align.

[@HojDee]

@@Nilsser I meant to just try it on a simple mesh in another engine version to see if it worka or not. In your case you could use blender or substance painter then

[@berryrobot9825]

why there are two drawcalls with only one material?

[@HojDee]

It was a mistake from me. There's only one :)

[@ivanzhang4060]

The result is not the correct map.

[@Zarrar2802]

How to merge materials for skeletal meshes? Trying to merge a skeletal mesh has merge actors button greyed out with message "insufficient mesh components found for merging"

[@HojDee]

Unfortunately it's only for static meshes