UE4 lightmap bake loses normal map definition?

JayDonovan

Hey!

So I've recently noticed in UE4 that after I bake light, the baked shadow information drowns out the normal map edge definition, is there a way to avoid this without adding more geo? It looks like it only takes the mesh geo into consideration and not the normal map?

teodar23

I think you might have a very low res lightmap. Also theres an option to bake normalmap info into the lightmap. It should work without it but maybe give it a try.
Also, wrong thread...

JayDonovan

Ahh thanks! I'll look into that after work. Also for future reference, where's the best place to post questions/stuff like this? The Unreal Engine thread?

Minos

That happens because your lightmap UVs have seams in those places. You can try to author a custom lightmap UV set, and try to minimize UV seams. Or as teodar23 said, if you increase the lightmap res it might improve it, but be careful if you do that everywhere (unless you are working on a portfolio piece, so performance doesn't matter much).