Substance Painter - Baking Issue

aniket · Apr 2018

Whenever I try to bake my maps, I get this error "Not enough data in the high poly to use selected baker. Aborting bake." The bake actually works, partially. Sections of the mesh have the detail from the high poly mesh I used to bake the maps, other areas however become faceted/jagged. If you need more information, just ask I am happy to provide. I really would appreciate some help

What the low poly mesh looks like before baking:

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/5021068/uploads/editor/xl/zmqpnzwn04fj.png

What it looks like after baking:

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/5021068/uploads/editor/c6/fr2lxyg0a16u.png

What the high poly mesh actually looks like:

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/5021068/uploads/editor/oj/ibnlgwcd0v5o.png

The full error log:

aniket · Apr 2018

Ok so I managed to make both the error messages go away by changing the baking settings for the ID from vertex to material. However, the actual problem is still there, the normal map just isn't baking properly for some reason

Mark Dygert · Apr 2018

It could be a couple of things, its hard to tell without seeing the topology of the low poly, the UV layout and the resulting normal map.

Off the top of my head, based on the info here...
It could be an issue with the way the low poly is unwrapped, there might be overlapping UVs or edges that are too close to each other.
What do the problem areas look like on the normal map? If you relax those areas, do the problems go away?

It could be that the head is using a tiny part of a small texture. Does the issue get better if you render at a larger size? If so you might want to rethink the UV layout.

It could be a topology issue on the low poly that is causing weird distortion in the cage/projection. Do you have a way of previewing the cage/projection? In 3dsmax I apply a projection modifier and it lets me see the cage, tweak it, test it and export it. Other baking solutions like xNormal allow you to specify a separate cage mesh.

poopipe · Apr 2018

The error message is purely due to missing vertex color data. The rest of it is likely projection distance errors.

As a starting point use 0.01 for forward and 0.5 for rear, if that doesn't work you're probably best off using a cage.

aniket · Apr 2018

Yeah so it turns out its a combination of bad UVs and the fact that my entire mesh is a single texture set. Cuz I'm getting issues on my toes and fingers that's clearly from parts interfering with each other which requires me to separate them out. As for the face and other areas, it's just a lack of topology and bad UVs. I will post back with results after for anyone else that might be having this problem with a clear depiction of the solution.

betaflight · Apr 2018

I have received the same error message when I forgot to name my meshes properly, ex. model_high and model_low

poopipe · Apr 2018

The first bit of that message is clearly about vertex color - caused by trying to bake vertex color when none is present

The second is a general message about a lack of data in the high poly. If you named everything wrong and used match by name it could conceivably happen but in this case its irrelevant..

Manjiana · Oct 2018

I also got the same error, though my topology was fine and the bake looked good. But the ID map was empty, but I changes the ID baker parameters -> Color Source to Material Color and it fixed the ID map.

Yevhen · Apr 2022

https://polycount.com/discussion/comment/2654632#Comment_2654632

Dear Manjiana, thanks a lot for your suggestion. It really helped. Thank you.

Substance Painter - Baking Issue

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