Mari 8.0 textures without UVs and hides tile repetition

Foundry has released Mari 8.0 — a new version of the 3D texture editor; the previous stable release was Mari 7.5. The main changes landed in the node graph: more than 50 new nodes were added. Most of them handle mathematical operations, but there are also nodes for A/B comparison, color correction and hexagonal texture tiling. New ways to generate masks and make edits within workflows have appeared as well.

The public beta opened on 2 July 2026.

Two nodes that remove the dependency on UV layout

The Tri-Planar Tiled node projects a single 2D image onto the model along three axes at once — X, Y and Z. It is intended for models with distorted layouts and awkwardly placed seams, as well as for geometry with no UVs at all. The existing Triplanar Projection node works with up to three separate images; the new one works with just one. It comes with a set of blending controls: a Smart mode that preserves high-frequency detail, noise-based blending, plus adjustable ranges and falloff curves.

The second newcomer, Hex Tile, reduces noticeable tile repetition: instead of a rectangular grid, the texture is laid out and blended across a hexagonal one. The technique is no longer exotic in the industry — hex tiling is supported by Houdini, Redshift and RenderMan, so its arrival in Mari closes a gap in the pipeline.

Comparing variants, masks by color and 49 math nodes

The Compare node performs an A/B wipe comparison between different node streams, which makes iterating on a material's look easier.

Masks make up a separate block of changes. Color ID masks can now be created straight from a selection on the canvas or from Selection Groups, and the new Color Mask and Multi Color Mask nodes generate a mask from the model's surface color — by a single color or by a set of colors. On top of that, a mask port can be added to any node in the graph.

Elsewhere in the graph:

• 49 math nodes — from arithmetic and trigonometry to conditional logic and advanced randomization;
• Color Remap, which gathers hue, saturation, exposure and gamma adjustments into a single node;
• the transform nodes Coordinate Transform (for nodes with a Position input) and UV Radial Transform.

On interface and projects: trackball-style camera navigation was added as an alternative to the standard Orbit tool, along with a visual marker for archived projects on library thumbnails, logical operators in shelf search and reading cameras from USD files (read-only).

Reference platform, requirements and pricing

Mari has moved to the VFX Reference Platform CY2025 specification. The newer CY2026 and CY2027 already exist, but for Mari 7.5, which lags five spec versions behind, this is a step forward — studios whose pipeline is strictly tied to the reference platform should check this before updating. Mari 8.0 is compatible with Windows 11 and Rocky Linux/RHEL 9.

Licensing remains rental-based — a perpetual license cannot be bought. An individual subscription costs $86 per month or $689 per year, a team one $1289 per year, which is $60 more than at the time Mari 7.5 shipped.

Why Foundry is investing specifically in the graph

The priorities in 8.0 read plainly: hand-painting on the model in Mari has long been well sorted out, while procedural material assembly has become the growth point. Against the backdrop of Substance's node tools having taught the industry to build textures out of node networks, and hexagonal tiling already being present in Houdini, Redshift and RenderMan, the set of triplanar projection, Hex Tile and half a hundred math nodes looks like an alignment with the standard that has taken hold in the industry.

The update will probably do the most for texture artists working on large assets with problematic layouts — scans, environments, crowds — and for lookdev teams, for whom A/B comparison cuts down approval rounds. The release looks less fortunate for studios tied to recent reference platform specifications and for those counting on perpetual licenses: the rental model stays, and the price for teams is creeping up. If the trend continues, future Mari versions will likely keep shifting the center of gravity toward the procedural side, leaving the brush as a tool for final polish.

What lies behind this emphasis Foundry places on procedural nodes: pressure from Substance, requests from virtual production studios, savings on UV layout?