Doom3world

I've seen MikeBarts tutorial on Texture baking in 3DSMax 8, it's very well written and the technique seems highly efficient, but I am running maya and currently struggling to find any information that would explain how this principle could transfer over?

I basically want it so if I build a high poly model (or a few of them) which comprises of different materials with varying normal and diffuse maps, I can then bake that onto a low poly model, integrating the 3D info defined by its shape, the colour defined by the numerous diffuse maps and the normal maps of each material into one texture. Essentially so Maya can create a normal map which is a combination of the high poly model and the detailed bump maps derived from the individual materials.

Sorry if that's confusing, I'll reword if that helps in a bit of a rush at the moment. If anyone knows a way of doing this in maya or could advice on an alternate method (i also use ZBrush but havent experimented too much with it yet) it'd be greatly, greatly appreciated.

Cheers!

If u press f6 (while having an view selected) and then go under the lightning/shading meny and choose transfer maps u will have a list off all the diffrent formats maya are able to bake for ya

Also mayas help manuall is very handy when seraching for stuff like this and its really fast to find an answer.

I don't know what the case is with Maya specifically -- I've never used it -- but I tried something like this with Lightwave about two years ago.

I couldn't find a way to accomplish it stock. I had to resort to a plugin.

I found a suitable plugin called Microwave but I don't see a version available for Maya.