Think I've cracked it.. I got the area light to behave that way by unchecking diffuse and checking ambient in the light, using cylinder and along axis light mode. using mental ray bake, I can get the right results.. Cheers everyone who replied!
If you want to transfer just color (from the diffuse image) 1 - Render Settings > Common > Turn the Default Maya light off... 2. Color> Batch Bake Mental Ray Options > Light and Color then make sure you have it set to "Bake to vertecies". 3. Start baking If you're really going to get deep into this, a good thing is to have…