3D Level Design: Reflection Probes in Unity

Intro

In this article, we are going to go over how to add reflection probes to your game scene. Reflection probes are like a cameras that captures a spherical view of its surroundings in all directions. The captured image is then stored as a Cubemap that can be used by objects with reflective materials.

The image above first shows the scene with reflection probe off then it shows it on.

Adding a Reflection Probe

In the hierarchy add a reflection probe.

This will produce the reflection probe which is a sphere object with a cube around it.

This sphere captures the surrounding area or scene and

and pasting that reflection into this box.

You can adjust the size of the reflection box and position of the sphere to fit your scene. You can have multiple reflection probes, but you want to make sure their reflection boxes do not overlap or interfere with one another.

You can also the intensity of the reflections.

One thing I want to note is every time you adjust the position of the reflection probe, you may need to rebake the scene to capture the new surrounding.

If you are having to do this, it is due to Auto Generate being off in your Lighting settings.

I suggest turning Auto Generate on, which will automatically rebake the reflection probe every time you move it.

Reflection probes can be hit or miss when it comes to make your game scene look better, so the best thing to do is put into the scene and determine for yourself.