#  Substrate Anisotropy lost when enabling translucency 

**URL:** <https://forums.unrealengine.com/t/substrate-anisotropy-lost-when-enabling-translucency/2768700>\
**Category:** Issues and Bug Reporting (Unreal Engine)\
**Tags:** unreal-engine, Substrate\
**Created:** [September 14, 2026, 3:30pm UTC](https://forums.unrealengine.com/t/substrate-anisotropy-lost-when-enabling-translucency/2768700 "2026-09-14T15:30:34Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Rx1000s](https://d3kjluh73b9h9o.cloudfront.net/original/4X/2/8/5/28502927f1d97ba1051b3b47ccfe17233bf41ef0.png) [@Rx1000s](https://forums.unrealengine.com/u/Rx1000s)\
**Post date:** [September 14, 2026, 3:30pm UTC](https://forums.unrealengine.com/t/substrate-anisotropy-lost-when-enabling-translucency/2768700/1 "2026-09-14T15:30:34Z")

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### Summary

While testing the Substrate system in Unreal Engine 5.6, enabling Translucency still preserved the Anisotropic shading features correctly.  
However, in Unreal Engine 5.7 and 5.8, enabling translucency causes Anisotropy to stop working entirely.

### What Type of Bug are you experiencing?

Rendering (Graphics / Niagara)

### Steps to Reproduce

1. use a substrate slab BSDF node.  
2.set Albedo and F0 to 1, Roughness to 0.3, Anisotropy to 0.8, now a anisotropy effect on preview model.  
3.set blend mode to translucent and set lighting mode to surface forwardshading  
4.the anisotropic effect is missing.

### Expected Result

Translucent Substrate materials should retain anisotropic shading behavior

### Observed Result

The material loses all anisotropic highlights and behaves as if anisotropy is turned off.

### Affects Versions

5.8

### Platform(s)

Windows

### Additional Notes

I checked the shader source code and found a behavioral change inside SubstrateEvaluations.ush. Compared to 5.6, bHasAnisotropy was added an additional requirement SUPPORTS\_ANISOTROPIC\_MATERIAL. After remove this requirement, I can see the Anisotropic Effect after Enable translucency