VFX Reference Platform CY2026 & CY2027 for VFX and animation →

The free, open-source alternative to ZBrush

Sculpt it. Forge it.
Ship it.

Digital sculpting for VFX, animation and game studios on Linux, macOS and Windows: the brushes, symmetry and navigation ZBrush artists already know, with no subscription. It ships VFX Reference Platform builds, OpenUSD and a Python API for studio pipelines, one-click game-ready LODs and Send to Unreal, plus free built-in AI: describe a brush and Brush Lab builds it, or turn a sketch or a sentence into a model you can sculpt.

ZBrush-style sculpting for VFX, animation and games, with VFX Reference Platform builds, OpenUSD and Python, plus free built-in AI: an AI brush creator and sketch to 3D.

Download For VFX & animation

VFX Reference Platform
Free built-in AI
No account
No telemetry
Windows · macOS · Linux

Real recording of SculptForge, scripted demo at 1080p.

Built for VFX & animation VFX Reference Platform CY2026 · CY2027 Rocky Linux 8 & 9 Python 3.13 OpenUSD Rez See how →

Everything a sculptor needs, nothing in the way

A focused sculpting app that starts instantly, works offline and fits straight into VFX, animation and game pipelines.

Sculpt the way you already do

Fourteen brushes including Clay Buildup, Dam Standard, Snake Hook, Trim and Move, with alphas, lazy mouse, symmetry, tablet pressure, ZBrush-style navigation, subdivision and voxel remesh.

Masking and polygroups

Hold Ctrl to paint a mask, mask by cavity, and grow, shrink or blur it. Auto-group by angle or by piece, then Ctrl+Shift+click to isolate a group and work on just that part.

SubTools

Keep the body, eyes, teeth and armour as separate meshes. Append, split, merge and solo them, Alt+click to pick one, and export each as its own object to glTF, FBX, USD or straight back to ZBrush.

Polypaint and MatCaps

Paint colour straight onto the sculpt, tint the cavities, and judge forms under Red Wax, Clay, Skin, Bronze, Chrome or White materials.

Works with ZBrush

Open and save GoZ files with polygroups, masks, UVs and polypaint, and send models to and from ZBrush on Windows and macOS. Project files keep everything, with autosave and crash recovery.

Brush Lab: describe a brush

"Dry cracked mud." "Overlapping dragon scales." An AI turns words into a brush you can tweak with sliders. Share it with a brush code, a studio folder or the community gallery.

Generate 3D from an image or text

Reconstruct a full, sculptable model from a sketch, a piece of concept art or a description, for free through Hunyuan3D, TRELLIS.2 and Stable Fast 3D on Hugging Face, on your own ComfyUI, or with fal.ai or Meshy.

Game & animation ready

Sculpt layers become blend shapes and morph targets, and a whole LOD chain is one click. Export FBX, glTF, OpenUSD, OBJ and PLY, checked with the Khronos and OpenUSD validators.

Send to Unreal

One click imports or updates your asset in a running Unreal Editor, on this computer or another one on your network. Static meshes come with LODs, skeletal meshes with morph targets.

Gaussian splats

Load phone captures as a sculpting reference, turn them into watertight meshes, or turn your sculpt into splats. Supports PLY, .splat, glTF KHR_gaussian_splatting and OpenUSD.

Works with ComfyUI

Run any ComfyUI workflow on your own GPU or studio server to generate models straight into SculptForge, and use SculptForge's remesh, LOD and USD/FBX export nodes inside ComfyUI graphs.

Scriptable, and agent-ready

sculptforge-cli runs any operation headless for build farms. Its built-in MCP server lets Claude Code, Claude Desktop or any MCP client sculpt, convert and export.

VFX Reference Platform CY2026 · CY2027

Built for VFX and animation pipelines

SculptForge follows the VFX Reference Platform and is built and tested in its reference environments on every commit. There's no licence server, no seats and no accounts, and every editor action is scriptable from Python or the command line.

CY2026 · CY2027VFX Reference Platform builds in every release

Rocky Linux 8 & 9glibc 2.28 / 2.34, verified in CI

GCC 14.2 · C++20gcc-toolset-14, as the platform specifies

Python 3.13import sculptforge with NumPy mesh access

OpenUSD in and out

USDA and USDZ, with each SubTool as its own Mesh prim and sculpt layers as UsdSkel blend shapes. Exports are checked with OpenUSD's usdchecker.
Rez package

rez-build --install puts the app and CLI on PATH and the Python module on PYTHONPATH.
Headless and farm-ready

sculptforge-cli runs every operation without a display: remesh, decimate, LODs, USD, FBX and glTF export. Turntables and review images render offscreen.
No conflicts with your stack

No Qt, Boost, TBB or OpenEXR to clash with the versions your other tools load. The few dependencies are linked statically.
Nothing phones home

No licence server, telemetry or account. It runs on air-gapped workstations and farm nodes.
Make it yours

GPL-3.0: fork it and wire it into your asset system. In-house changes can stay in-house; you only share source if you distribute a modified version outside your organisation.

# Python 3.13, inside your pipeline
import sculptforge as sf

doc = sf.Document()
sf.run(doc, "open", path="/show/troll/troll_base.fbx")
sf.run(doc, "remesh", resolution=320)
sf.run(doc, "export_usd", path="/show/troll/troll_sculpt.usda")
verts = doc.vertices            # NumPy (N, 3) float32

# Deploy with Rez, run anywhere on the farm
rez-build --install
rez-env sculptforge -- sculptforge-cli -c \
  'open path=troll.fbx; export_lods path=troll.glb levels=4'
rez-env sculptforge -- sculptforge troll.usda \
  --render review.png --turntable 8

Read the studio guide VFX builds

See it in action

Every clip is a real, unedited recording of the app, made with its built-in demo recorder. Waits for AI models are sped up and labelled on screen.

Brush Lab: the AI brush creator

Type "dry cracked mud", and AI designs the brush. Then ask for "deeper cracks, sharper edges". It's free out of the box with no key. This clip uses a small open model running on the same machine, so nothing leaves the computer.

The teddy bear reconstructed as a full 3D model

From a sketch to a sculptable model in about 20 seconds

A quick drawing became a full 3D model, with separate ears, arms and legs, a back and real depth. It was made with the free Hunyuan3D 2.1 model, then voxel-remeshed into one clean surface ready to sculpt. You can also type a description instead of using an image.

Blend shapes, LODs and Unreal

Sculpt an expression on its own layer and play it back. Generate a LOD chain and inspect each level, then send a static mesh with LODs, or a skeletal mesh with morph targets, to Unreal Engine.

Gaussian splats, both ways

Turn a sculpt into Gaussian splats for web viewers and engines, and turn splat captures into watertight meshes in under a second.

Free AI built in, or bring your own

Two AI tools work out of the box at no cost and with no sign-up. Every AI feature is optional and talks directly to the service you pick. SculptForge has no servers, no account and no telemetry.

Brush Lab, the AI brush creator: describe a brush ("dry cracked mud", "overlapping dragon scales"), and AI builds it as a recipe with every value on a slider. Then refine it in plain words. Free through an open model on Pollinations.ai, no key needed.
Generate 3D: turn a sketch, concept art or a sentence into a full model you can sculpt, free through Hunyuan3D, TRELLIS.2 and Stable Fast 3D on Hugging Face.
Local models (Ollama, LM Studio) for brush design. They're free, private and work offline. Set one up in five minutes on Windows, macOS or Linux.
Your own ComfyUI (local or a studio GPU server) runs any image or text to 3D workflow, with ready-made Hunyuan3D 2.1 workflows included. ComfyUI guide.
Bring your own Claude, fal.ai or Meshy key when you want more speed or capacity.

Each model has its own licence. For example, Tencent's Hunyuan3D isn't licensed for use in the EU, UK or South Korea. See the AI services and privacy guide.

How it compares

	SculptForge	ZBrush	Blender	Nomad
Price	Free	Subscription	Free	Paid
Built for sculpting	Yes	Yes	General 3D suite	Yes (mobile first)
Open source	GPL	No	GPL	No
Native Linux	Yes	No	Yes	No
Send to Unreal	Built in	Plugin	Add-on	No
Image / text to 3D	Built in	No	Add-ons	No
Gaussian splats	Built in	No	Add-ons	No
AI agent control (MCP)	Built in	No	Add-ons	No
VFX Reference Platform builds	CY2026/27	No	Yes	No

SculptForge is young. It doesn't yet have retopology, UVs or texture painting. See the roadmap.

Download

Version 0.2.0. All builds come from the latest GitHub release, with SHA-256 checksums.

Windows10 / 11 · installer or portable .zip macOS11+ · Apple Silicon & Intel · .dmg Ubuntu / Debian.deb · x86_64 & ARM64 Fedora / RHEL 9+.rpm · x86_64 & ARM64 Any LinuxAppImage · runs anywhere

Arch Linuxyay -S sculptforge

VFX Reference PlatformCY2026 (Rocky 8) & CY2027 (Rocky 9) · .tar.gz with Python module Rezpackaging/rez · build and install your own package

The builds aren't code-signed yet. On macOS, right-click the app and choose Open the first time. On Windows, if SmartScreen appears, choose More info → Run anyway. You can also build from source.

Questions

Is it really free? Can I sell what I make?

Yes. SculptForge is free under the GPL-3.0, and you own everything you sculpt with it. The GPL covers the program's source code, not your models. If you use an AI model to generate a starting point, that model's licence also applies (see the AI services guide).

Do I need AI to use it?

No. Sculpting, layers, LODs, remeshing, file formats and Send to Unreal all work offline with no AI at all. The AI tools are extras you can switch to a local model or simply ignore.

Which Unreal versions work with Send to Unreal?

It targets Unreal Engine 5. It uses Unreal's built-in Python remote execution, so you only enable the Python plugin and tick "Enable Remote Execution"; there's nothing to install in your project. You can always export an Unreal-ready FBX instead.

Can SculptForge replace ZBrush for me?

For many sculpting and game-asset jobs, yes. Blocking out, sculpting forms and detail, blend shapes, LODs and getting assets into Unreal, glTF or USD all work today, with familiar brushes and controls. Masking, polygroups and hide/show, polypaint, MatCaps, project files and GoZ exchange with ZBrush work too, with the controls ZBrush users expect. SculptForge doesn't yet have multiresolution subdivision levels, dynamic topology, ZRemesher-class retopology or UV unwrapping, and it can't open ZBrush's .ZTL files (use GoZ, or export OBJ or FBX from ZBrush). It's an independent project, not affiliated with Maxon.

Does it fit a VFX studio pipeline?

Yes. Every release includes VFX Reference Platform CY2026 and CY2027 builds (Rocky Linux 8 and 9, GCC 14.2, Python 3.13), there's a Rez package, and everything the app does can be scripted from Python or the headless CLI. It reads and writes OpenUSD (USDA/USDZ), FBX and glTF. Binary .usdc, USD references and OpenColorIO aren't supported yet. See the studio guide.

How can I help?

Try it, report bugs, share brushes, and send pull requests. See CONTRIBUTING.md.

Sculpt it. Forge it.Ship it.