What does it look like if you try to bake without the cage.
Ok I’m pretty close now. I used a different method to make a cage and it’s much better. I still have an issue though. There’s some kind of projection issue with the Normals map when I apply it to the mesh. I don’t know how to explain it other than it’s not mapping properly. Take a look at the pics…
Delete UV channel 0 in your 3d modeling application, you have 2 UV channels when you only need 1.
You could also just tell UE4 to use the UVs of the second channel in the material editor with the TexCord node.
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Delete UV channel 0 in your 3d modeling application, you have 2 UV channels when you only need 1.
You could also just tell UE4 to use the UVs of the second channel in the material editor with the TexCord node.
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i thought UE needs 2 channels when you import?! 1 channel for texture mapping and the other for lightmaps?
UE4 will automatically make a light map based off your first UV channel. If your model is unwrapped like mine in the guide, the auto generated one will work well.
Thanks heaps Zac! Finally, success.
I’m still a little confused though because every tutorial I’ve watched and forum I’ve read has drilled into people you need 2 channels. One for texture mapping, and one for Light maps. I know you said that Unreal can generate light maps too, but isn’t it better that I do this manually in 3Ds? I’ve read that Unreal can be a bit funny generating light maps at times. Also, how do I go about telling Unreal to use the 2nd channel using a TexCord node in the material editor?
Generally there’s a few things that don’t lightmap well without custom uvs. Walls, and things that have overlapping uvs (that aren’t separate islands), and things with lots of unneeded UV splits for light maps. In my guide for this model I kept the number of UV splits low, and generally in areas you don’t see, so you don’t need to mess with having a custom lightmap channel. The light fixture in this thread also did not have custom uvs in my example, i just let UE4 auto generate them.
To change the UV channel for a texture, all you have to do is plug a texture coordinate node in the material editor into your textures and set the channel. Super easy and straightforward.
A small little video tutorial on this would be highly appreciated! 
I could make a video tutorial, but I’m not sure what it would add. If I was to make one, would you want me to use this couch model, or something else?
Need a video tutorial for noobs like me.
yeah pls make one 
i make some Res model, but not low poly
in mudbox and look good!
I started to learn substance painter and it has some very cool baking tools (as ZacD suggested already). 1st, you don’t need to explode anything in 3ds max/maya/blender, whatever. You can bake by mesh name. You must name all your meshes with the _low / _high suffix (for example cushion1_low, cushion1_high, cushion2_low, cushion2_high, etc) . You also don’t need to make a cage. Instead with the frontal and rear distance you make a virtual envelope around your highpoly/lowpoly and it will be used to cast rays to make your normal map.
I just tought i’d share, it simplifies the workflow for me.
One little tip here: When you made the effort of baking a normal map already, then why not bake the AO map at the same time? Unreal 4 has a dedicated slot for AO. It applies it differently depending if the objects gets direct light or not. I think it will make your model look better, especially from a little distance where detailed shadow might just disappear otherwise.
Unreal needs a lightmap that is not overlapping, has no stitched hard edges, has good sized gaps and doesn’t stick out of the main uv square. If your regular/first uv channel does all that then you don’t need a 2nd one for the lightmap. You can set the channel in the mesh property window in the static mesh section. No need to do anything in the material.
sorry for the noob question but how do you reduce the poly without damaging the model, im following your tutorial but using a fabric
Am I correct in thinking the optimal way to do Piping at the corners of fabrics should be done using a normal map to avoid issues with light baking? Up to now I have been using a thickened spline in 3ds max then deleting faces which point inwards but you still do get some shadow artifacts.
Also would baking the normal map in 3ds max pick up the mesh for the piping and add that to the normal map?
Kinda along what Orkney said, I would make the mesh one sided and use the double sided settings in UE4. The automatically decimated geometry should be fine, hopefully you can get a flat, clean, single piece UV island without much work.
how to unwrap this complex objects ue4 ?
pelt mapping does not help me with this !
screenshots of ue4 and 3ds max attached
there is some blacks on object after rendering
Ideally, you’d unwrap a piece of cloth like that before you performed a cloth sim on it. It looks like that did happen because there are clean tiling UVs for the cloth pattern.