Output Map

Quality

Determines the quality of the final ambient occlusion map based on multiple shadow maps used for the calculation. Preset values include: Fastest, Fast, Normal, Good, and Best. A higher quality setting increases the number of shadow maps, produces a higher quality map, and increases the time to generate the ambient occlusion map.

Advanced

Shadow Map Resolution

Controls the size of the shadow maps for the occlusion map calculations. Values are preset at 256 x 256, 512 x 512, 1024 x 1024, 2048 x 2048, 4096 x 4096. The shadow maps are not accessible and are discarded after the generation of the occlusion map.

Increasing the Shadow Map Resolution produces a more detailed occlusion map and increases the time to generate it. In general, set the Shadow Map Resolution to the lowest value that produces an occlusion map of acceptable quality. Default is 1024 x 1024.

Shadow Darkness

Controls the brightness of the ambient occlusion map. Decreasing the value brightens the resulting ambient occlusion map. Increasing the value darkens the resulting ambient occlusion map. The default setting is 0.5.

Shadow Contrast

Controls the contrast between shaded and non-shaded areas in the ambient occlusion map. Decreasing the value reduces contrast, producing more mid-tone gray values in the map. Increasing the value increases contrast, producing tones that are more black and white. The default contrast setting is 0 (neutral contrast) with the lower and upper range of -1 and 1.

Filter

Controls the filtering of multiple shadow map calculations when producing the final ambient occlusion map. To achieve sharp, finely detailed shadows, set a low value (0.0001). To produce a softer effect, reducing visible artifacts in the map, set a higher number.

Related topics

Common map extraction options