What does mean to "cook" lighting or "baked" lighting?.

Development Rendering
1

Hi, I’m just starting with UE4 (and my 3D knowledge is basic), and there are some terms that I get lost when watching tutorials, for example, sometimes people talk about baking the lighting, like if it provides an advantage over dynamic lighting. I assume it means that the lighting is precalculated and it wont change later, however, I’m not sure that’s correct.

So, in other words, what does it mean to bake/cook the lighting?, what does it do?.

Thanks.

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2

You got it right. Baking lighting means precalculate the static global illumination which then doesn’t change in runtime. It’s also possible to use fully dynamic lighting and avoid baking completely.

3

So it only applies to static sources of light, not specific lights like a lantern, for example.

If I want to simulate the complete cycle of the sun, that means the light needs to be dynamic, right?.

4

You can have both static and dynamic lights in the level. When you bake the lighting your static and stationary lights are backed but dynamic ones such as cycling sun don’t.

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5

Is there a place where I can learn more about lights and how they work in UE4?.

6

try this:) Lighting Tools and Plugins in Unreal Engine | Unreal Engine 5.3 Documentation

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7

Thanks !.