Modo Height Map Bake

Zack Maxwell

For various reasons, I need to bake a detailed height map from Modo, but I can't figure out how.
It doesn't appear to be possible through anything as simple as selecting a Render Output, and searching online hasn't gotten me anywhere.
Does anyone know how this can be done?

Tzur_H

I'm pretty sure you need to create a new image map as an output, and set its "effect" to displacement.
Shading tree -> add layer -> image map -> new image -> change effect to displacement -> right click on the image map and towards the bottom you got baking options.

Dataday

Not to familiar with getting height maps out of Modo, but have you tried baking to a displacement map layer?

Add: Tzur beat me to it.

Farfarer

Yeah, there isn't a render output for it (other than camera depth). You'll have to set up a texture set to displacement and bake that.

If it's just a flat texture you're baking then you can rig up a gradient texture and set it to Driver A and bake that out with a render output.

Leuey

A quick way would be to go to the paint tab and under the utilities tab at the left select 'geometry to brush' - you can bake out a height map from here.

-G

ShawnRitter

I just wanted to say a big thank you to Leuey. His comment about using the "geometry to brush" tool was exactly what I was looking for. Thanks for the help. I was banging my head against a wall searching for ways to bake an alpha or height map out of modo. Thanks.

mickeyvpn

@Leuey Thank you, it's exactly I was looking for. Fastest way to bake alpha in MODO.

igi

yeah. I discovered this 'geomery to brush' feaure a year ago and since then It's just a breeze to bake height map to flat surfaces. Great way to prepare custom displacement alphas. More people should informed about it.

Elowan

Leuey said:

A quick way would be to go to the paint tab and under the utilities tab at the left select 'geometry to brush' - you can bake out a height map from here.

-G

Hmmm - looks like in 2021 on MODO 14.2 this does not work anymore... I imported a mountain mesh (100k faces), selected it and switched to the Paint tab (never used that before) and clicked "Geometry to brush", projection along Z axis.... Modo bakes for a while and returns a completely grey image, when baking Vector displacement. If switching over to "height field", the image is just black.

Another funny thing: After baking, a window opens (guess it would be a preview of baked Image?) and it can not be closed!
(closes only, when closing Modo as well)

Gaurav Mathur

@Elowan, I recommend joining the MODO Slack channel, which is fairly active these days:
https://join.slack.com/t/foundry-modo/shared_invite/enQtMzc1OTUzOTk1NDkyLTRhMDdiOTI0MzU4ZmY3N2UyMDYwYjM3YTZjOWQxMGVjZGVhM2I0YjA1ZTc0MDk1NDA1MmVkOGYxNGY2ZGQwNzk

Have you posted in the MODO Community Forums?
https://community.foundry.com/discuss/forum/150/baking

Elowan

thanks a lot for the link!

for others, that may stranded here: It still work like Leuey pointed out - if there are no transforms on your mesh

Cheers!