Face Textures — Per-Face Material Assignment
Give each face of a 3D shape its own material — stone top, brick sides, concrete underside.
Face Textures — Per-Face Material AssignmentFace Textures are accessed from the Inspector when an extruded 3D shape is selected. The panel shows material slots for each face group:
| Slot | Description | |------|-------------| | Top Face | The upper horizontal surface — the visible surface of patios, decks, step treads, and planting bed tops | | Side Face | The vertical sides of the extrusion — wall faces, step risers, planter walls | | Bottom Face | The underside — typically not visible but relevant for floating structures or sections views |
Each slot can hold a different material chosen from the material browser. If a slot is left empty, it inherits from the shape's main material assignment. If no main material is assigned either, the default neutral material is applied.
Materials can also be dragged directly from the Materials panel onto specific faces in the 3D viewport.
Opening the Face Textures panel
Select an extruded 3D shape in the 3D view (click it once). In the Inspector sidebar, scroll to the Materials section and click Face Textures.
The Face Textures panel expands showing three rows: Top Face, Side Face, and Bottom Face. Each row shows the currently assigned material thumbnail (or a blank slot if no material is assigned), the material name, and a button to open the material browser.
If the shape has not been extruded yet (it is still a flat 2D shape), the Face Textures panel is not shown. Extrude the shape first.
The Face Textures panel is the same panel regardless of which surface preset is active. Even shapes using Dome, Ridge, or Sculpt presets can have per-face material assignments — the top face material follows the curved or sculpted surface.
Assigning a material from the material browser
Click the material slot button (the thumbnail or the pencil icon beside it) for the face you want to assign. The material browser opens.
In the material browser: 1. Browse categories or use the search field to find the desired material 2. Click a material thumbnail to preview it on the shape in real time 3. Click Apply to confirm the assignment, or click a different material to preview that instead 4. Click Cancel to close the browser without changing the assignment
Repeat for each face slot you want to customize. A slot left empty inherits from the shape's base material.
To remove a face material assignment and return to inheriting the base material, click the X button beside the material thumbnail in the slot.
When working on a patio with a timber decking material on top and a concrete plinth below, assign the decking material to Top Face and the concrete material to Side Face. The junction between them will be clean and seamless in the 3D render.
Dragging materials from the Materials panel onto faces
As an alternative to the material browser, you can drag materials directly onto specific faces in the 3D viewport:
1. Open the Materials panel from the left toolbar (or from the Inspector) 2. Click and hold a material thumbnail in the Materials panel 3. Drag it over the 3D shape — the face under the cursor highlights as you hover 4. Release the mouse button to drop the material onto that face
The material is assigned only to the face group that was highlighted at the moment of release:
- Hovering over the flat top surface highlights the Top Face slot
- Hovering over a vertical side highlights the Side Face slot
- Hovering over the underside highlights the Bottom Face slot
Dragging materials is faster than using the browser when you are assigning many shapes in sequence.
Use drag-and-drop to quickly texture a whole patio sequence — keep the Materials panel open on one side and drag the paving material onto the top face of each shape in turn without opening the browser each time.
Adjust opacity, rotation, and scale
Every non-None fill mode exposes the same shared controls below the fill-specific settings: Opacity, Rotate (rotates the texture mapping), and Scale (tiling factor — higher values tile more). These controls let you align grout lines, match the texture direction to the design, or reduce the opacity of an image fill to blend it with a base color beneath.
Assign different fills to each face
Repeat the mode-and-controls process for the other face rows as needed. A common workflow for a garden step is: Top — natural stone photoreal material for the tread; the side faces (Front, Back, Left, Right) — brick or blockwork photoreal material for the riser; Bottom — plain concrete solid fill (often not visible but relevant in section views or elevated structures). To apply the current face's fill to every face at once, use the copy to all faces action in the row. Any face left on None continues to inherit from the shape's main material.
Clear a face assignment to restore inheritance
To remove a face-specific fill and return that face to inheriting the shape's main material, set its mode back to None. To clear every face at once, use Remove All Face Fills at the bottom of the panel. This is useful when you want to reset one face after experimenting with different fills, without affecting the other face assignments.
For walls and retaining structures, using a separate thin child shape (added via Build in the extrude stack) as a coping layer — with its own Top Face fill — gives cleaner material transitions than splitting assignments on one shape. The child shape's top face is fully independent and can use a different scale and rotation than the parent wall's side material.
The Bottom face is rarely needed for in-ground or ground-level structures. It becomes important for elevated decks, pergola beams, bridge elements, or any structure that will be viewed from below in 3D perspective or AI render mode.
Face fill assignments are stored per-entity. If you duplicate a shape, the face fills are copied to the new entity. Editing a fill on the duplicate does not affect the original — the two entities are fully independent after duplication.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does a face-specific fill override the shape's main material?
Yes. A fill assigned to a specific face group takes full precedence over the shape's main material for that face. The main material only applies to face groups that have no face-specific fill assigned. If neither a face fill nor a main material is present, the shape's surface class color is used as the fallback.
Can I assign different fills to individual side faces — for example, a different material on the front and back faces of a wall?
Yes for box-like shapes — the Front, Back, Left, and Right faces each have their own row, so you can assign a different fill to each. Ribbon walls (open-bezier or polyline) expose Front, Back, and Top only. If you need finer control than the available faces provide, split the shape into multiple extruded shapes positioned adjacently, each with its own face fills.
What is the difference between the Image fill mode and the photoreal material fill mode?
The Image fill mode uses a photo you upload — it renders as a flat texture with adjustable opacity, rotation, and scale. The photoreal material fill mode references a material from the shared material library and uses physically-based rendering (normal maps, roughness, ambient occlusion) for a more realistic result under varying lighting conditions. photoreal materials also use world-space UV mapping so the texture scales at a consistent real-world size regardless of the shape's footprint.
Do face texture assignments show up in PDF and AI render exports?
Yes. Face fills are rendered in the 3D view and in all exported 3D views — PNG, PDF, and AI render outputs. Each face's material renders independently in every export format.
I assigned a photoreal material to the Top Face but the texture looks stretched. How do I fix it?
Photoreal fills use world-space UV mapping, which means the texture scale is expressed in real-world units. If the texture appears stretched, adjust the Scale control in the face fill controls — a lower scale value zooms out the texture (larger tiles), a higher value zooms in (smaller tiles). You can also adjust Rotate to align grout lines or wood grain direction with the design.