Ambient Occlusion not cast by object

[Pamela Galli]

I am baking a floor, but one object, a bannister, does not have any effect on the floor AO -- it is like it is not there.

 

Is there some setting I have overlooked?

[Aquila Kytori]

hi

The most probable cause is the following :



[Pamela Galli]

What would I do without you? :matte-motes-big-grin:

 

But that's not it this time (it has been before and it usually does not occur to me).

I can just make shading and put it in the AO but for now I guess the mystery will remain unsolved.

I did look at the materials properties and some of them have a checkbox for Cast Shadows, which may or may not be relevant, but some of them do not have that option, no clue why the difference.

[Dree Eames]

Some things you might try:

Select the mesh that isn't contributing to the ao and:

Check normals to be sure they aren't facing the wrong direction

CTL A -  apply location, rotation, scale

If the "offender" has parts that are mirrored ,copied or arrayed apply the modifier .

Shift CTL A and "make duplicates real" in the event  the duplication is a linked duplicate.

 

Note I haven't tested any of these, but they are easy enough to try and one of these might do the trick.

[Aquila Kytori]

 

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PamelaGalli wrote:

I did look at the materials properties and some of them have a checkbox for Cast Shadows, which may or may not be relevant, but some of them do not have that option, no clue why the difference.

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For the Banisters material(s) make sure you have the Cast enabled in the Shadow menu !

If Cast is not checked then the Bannister Object will be ignored when you come to bake out the AO for the Floor Object.

I have never had cause to uncheck that option and only tried it after you mentioned the Shadows panel above.



 

[Chic Aeon]

Just a question as I have never had this issue but will remember this thread and hopefully find it again in the future should the issue come up ---

 

Is this a CYCLES render or a BLENDER RENDER?    In Cycles it will also depend very much on your lighing and if you have the Cast Shadows for the light source behind the object checked. I am guessing this must be Blender Render. I haven't used that in a long while but will check out those menus so I am more aware.

 

SO MANY MENUS!!!!! .

[Pamela Galli]

I am still in the dark about this, plus now I discover a piece of trim I have all over the house also will not cast AO.  I have checked and double checked. I found out that W in Object mode clears all rendering restrictions, but that had no effect.  

 

Meanwhile now I have a wall that I was baking to without a problem, suddenly give me the No Objects or Images found to bake to, and I went through the checklist on that (usually it just means I did not have the mesh selected in Object Mode). So I am thinking the file is corrupted.  But if anyone has any other suggestions, I am certainly grateful to hear them.

[Aquila Kytori]

 

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Pamela Galli wrote:

I am still in the dark about this, plus now I discover a piece of trim I have all over the house also will not cast AO.  I have checked and double checked. I found out that W in Object mode clears all rendering restrictions, but that had no effect. 

 

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1: In Edit mode select a section of the Trim mesh

2: Duplicate that part, Shift+D

3: Make the duplicated mesh a separate object, P

4: In Object mode make a copy of this new mesh object, Ctrl+C

5: Open a new Blender file, Crtl+N

6: Paste the copy into this new scene, Ctrl+V

7: In Object mode add a mesh Plane and UV unwrap it etc and sit your Trim mesh object on the Plane.

8: Is the Trim mesh object creating an AO shadow when you bake out an AO image for the Plane? If it still isn't, then save this new Blender file and upload it to  http://www.pasteall.org/blend/ and post the URL here so that we can get a copy and have a look at it.

 

[Pamela Galli]

Thanks Aquila -- I followed the directions twice (I did not know you could copy and paste between files!) but neither time would the trim paste. I exported as a dae but when I tried to import into the new file, it did not import.  So evidently the file is just borked. But all is not lost. I have these borked pieces previously saved as daes and have copies inworld. So in any case I can presumably get unbroken copies. 

[Aquila Kytori]

Just a note about copying and pasting between files, the pasted mesh will be pasted to the same layer in the new file as the one it was on in the original file.

If, for example, the trim was on layer 7 in the original file, you would have to look for the pasted copy on layer 7 of the new file !