Getting Started

Baking is always a bit tricky, but we try to make it as easy as possible.

The simplest method is to have everything inside Unity, provided that’s possible. For baking extremely large meshes, the files can be referenced externally. For this tutorial, we will be assuming that everything has been loaded into a Unity scene.

There are samples included under the samples directory. Please check out example_1 for a very simple bake setup. It’s set up so you can just click ‘bake’ and it will create a new texture for you. If you decide to start from scratch, this guide will get you started.

Step 1 – Open the scene and import your meshes.

• Create a new scene, or use an existing one.
• Import the mesh you want to use the texture on. This is typically a low poly mesh. We call this the ‘target mesh’, i.e. we are baking from a high res mesh onto this one..
• Import the mesh you want to use source of the detail. This is typically a high poly mesh. We call this the ‘source mesh’, i.e. where you get all the information from.
• Maybe add a light or two to see the surfaces.

These meshes should be a single object or a simple hierarchy of meshes under each.. For more complicated baking, see our grouping and name matching tutorials.

Your scene should look roughly like this.

Step 2 – Create a new bake component on a new object using the MightyBake workflow window

You can click the first button to create a blank bake object. Your hierarchy would look like this now.

Step 3 – Set up the basic settings

• Select the bake object
• Set the name of the textures you want
• Set the root directory you want them output to
• Choose a normal map (default) to bake

Step 4 – Add the meshes to the default group

• Click on the ‘edit’ button in the default group (image). .This will open a MightyBake Bake window that can be used independent of the selection.
• We recommend docking this so that you can use it as you change selection.
• Select the mesh you want to use as your target mesh (Low Poly) and then click the ‘Add Selection’ button in the Target Mesh area in the default group (image)
  • You should see your mesh appear under neath
• Select the mesh you want to use as your source mesh (High Poly) and then click the ‘Add Selection’ button in the Source Mesh area in the default group (image)

You’re now ready to bake.. Your bake should look roughly like this:

Step 5 – Click ‘Bake’

• You can either click ‘Bake All’ which wil bake this map or you can click ‘Bake’ next to the map name.
• MightyBake will begin loading the meshes and then rendering will start.
• Loading may take longer for larger meshes
• When rendering starts, you will see a preview of the progress.

Step 6 -(Optional) Cancel

• If you see the map is coming out wrong, you can cancel, which will let the baker quit after the completion of the next tile

Step 7 – Wait, and Close the window

• When the mesh is finished, there will be a new button allowing you to close the render window..
• MightyBake will have automatically hooked up the baked texture

Step 8 – Hook up your texture

• Click on the baked texture in and it will highlight in the asset browser
• You can then use this texture in any of the shaders for your low poly object
• If you want to preview the texture directly on the object, you can click the ‘show’ button on the map

Please see our other articles for details on other features and workflows.