Once you master the ability to modify pre-built textures the next natural step is learn how to add illumination or emissives to your custom textures to help denote objects that light up and represent sources of lumination. In Unity there is a difference in illumination between static and dynamic objects, static objects will actually act as a light source whereas dynamic objects only glow and do not emit light themselves.
In this example I’ll be using a 3D model of a TV to show it as lit. Any model will do (even a simple primitive like a sphere or cube) so feel free to use anything you’d like.
In your favorite image editing program open up the texture you wish to edit. This is the TV unwrapped, in my specific example I want to make the screen glow. So I’ll take my fuzzy select tool (Little wand in GIMP) and select the screen. Then I’ll create a layer with transparency and just the screen I want to make emissive. Then another layer inverted in complete black to tell the emissive layer that I do not want to make that glow. It should look like below.
Now export these two layers as an Emission texture into your project and go to the model in question. Under the Material settings you should see a check box for Emission and a place to put your new emission texture like so.
You can then set the illumination type (baked vs real-time) but since we’re using Uinversal Render Pipeline in this project. You would need to add a Global Volume and something like Bloom to make it pop out, so we’ll do that now. Right click > Volume > Global Volume this will create a global volume game object in the scene.
Next you’ll want to create a new profile by clicking the New button > Post Processing > Add Override > Bloom this will add the Boom volume override. Click ALL under Bloom and adjust the intensity.
Which should look similar on the same object you’re using. There you have it a nice glowy TV. To enable dynamic (or baked lighting) just add the appropriate type of light (maybe a point light?) to make it really pop. These simple changes can really make your scene stand out and help provide nice aesthetic changes as well as guide the player to certain objects or landmarks in your game. Until next time, happy coding.