Ambient oclusion and Normals

[Spinell]

Hello everyone. I thknk I might be having some problems with normals? I'm trying to bake ambient oclusion onto my mesh and some parts of it get a strange grainny effect. Also, the effect isn't confined to one full face of the mesh, it goes through (as if painted on). Not sure what this is.

 

[Spinell]

Hello everyone. I thknk I might be having some problems with normals? I'm trying to bake ambient oclusion onto my mesh and some parts of it get a strange grainny effect. Also, the effect isn't confined to one full face of the mesh, it goes through (as if painted on). Not sure what this is.

 

[MIstahMoose]

Not a normals problem  

Do you have overlaping UVs in that area of the unwrap?

[Spinell]

Ah! Thanks for the tip. Fixed. ^.^

[Dora Gustafson]

I am not sure what grains you are referring to but if you increase Samples, used to create the AO you will get finer shades

It will cost you computer time, but it is only a one time expense

:smileysurprised::smileyvery-happy:

[MIstahMoose]

Looks like you have a high enough sample, but you can check normalize under bake and it will make it all a lot more white.. I don't know how else to explain it  

Anyhow its easier to multiply it into the new texture if you bake a normalized map

[Drongle McMahon]

I also see in your pictures a sortb of banding effect that looks like a problem with the UV map. When two edge loops get placed on topm of each other in the UV map. then the surface between them gets textured with a single pixel at each point that is stretched to a horizontal/vertical line. here's an example of a cylinder, with the left hand one having the usual UV map (top) and the right hand one having two sets of edge loops superimposed with a small gap between, as shown in the lower UV map. The dotted lines show how the loops were moved. Used just a cloud texture to illustrate the effect.