How to bake AO onto textures in Blender?

[Sally Audebarn]

How do use Blender to bake ambiance occlusion directly onto a mesh that I've created in Blender. I am aware of the "combined" baking option, but that includes shadows, which I don't want. I also know about using Photoshop, but I'd rather do it in Blender. How can this be done? Thank you.

[Chic Aeon]

Not exactly sure what you are asking but Ambient Occlusion is in the same dropdown as Combined; right above it. This WILL give you a grayscale texture with AMBIENT (not cast) shadows. If you merely want a UV layout  with only the outlines of where you would add your texture, then you save that in the UVimage editor under IMAGE > SAVE AS IMAGE after you have unwrapped. No need to bake in that case.

 

 

[Sally Audebarn]

I mean, I wish to have the ambiance occlusion baked onto the raw texture that I apply to the mesh in blender. Kinda like the combined option but without the shadows and other effects - only ambiance occlusion.

[Pamela Galli]

Then you must add the texture to the material. Google should turn up tutorials showing how to do that.

[ChinRey]

Is there any particular reason why you don't want to use an image editor for the job? That seems to be a much better option. With Paint.net, which is what I use, it's a simple four step operation and you get far better control over the result than what Blender seems to be able to offer.

Edited June 25, 2017 by ChinRey
Removing suprefluous info

[Sally Audebarn]

Well, to be honest, painting on UV maps seem to be a bit challenging. Pamela, how do you texture your homes? Is there a particular method or program that you use to get such amazing results?

[ChinRey]

7 minutes ago, Sally Audebarn said:

Well, to be honest, painting on UV maps seem to be a bit challenging.

Oh, you mean how to create the AO map? That's easily done in Blender the way Chic mentioned. Here's very good tutorial video.

Essentially, what you do is let Blender create a pure AO map and then you merge it with the texture in an image editor.

Edited June 25, 2017 by ChinRey
typo

[Pamela Galli]

I mostly do what Chinrey describes, Sally.

Edited June 25, 2017 by Pamela Galli

[Sally Audebarn]

Thank you, guys. I have a bit of an unrelated question for you, Pamela. How do you take such bright interior pictures with shadows enabled, without the interior becoming dark? Also, what viewer do you use to take your pictures? Thank you.

[Pamela Galli]

I use Firestorm, and just experiment with Windlights.