Fixing Model Textures: Why They Look Different in Godot

The Great Lighting Divide: Blender vs. Godot

• Default Environments: Blender's viewport has a default lighting setup & environment map that it uses to display your models. This is designed to give you a clear, well-lit view of your work. Godot, on the other hand, starts with a pretty basic, if not completely empty, world environment. When you first drop your model into a new Godot scene, there's often no ambient light, no sky, & no reflections. It’s just your model in a void.
• Different Rendering Engines: Blender & Godot use different rendering engines. While both are moving towards physically based rendering (PBR), the specific implementations & algorithms they use can vary. Godot 4, for instance, uses the Vulkan rendering backend, which can have subtle differences in how it handles light, shadows, & materials compared to Blender’s Eevee or Cycles renderers.

1. Add an Environment: The most crucial step is to add a

   1 WorldEnvironment

   node to your scene. This node is where you'll control the ambient light, the background (sky), & other environmental effects like fog. You can create a new environment resource & start tweaking the settings.
2. Use a Sky: Inside the

   1 WorldEnvironment

   resource, you can add a

   1 Sky

   . A

   1 ProceduralSkyMaterial

   is a good starting point, as it gives you a customizable sky with a sun. You can also use a

   1 PanoramaSkyMaterial

   with an HDR image to get realistic lighting & reflections.
3. Add Lights: Don't rely solely on the environment. Add

   1 DirectionalLight3D

   nodes for sunlight,

   1 OmniLight3D

   for point lights, &

   1 SpotLight3D

   for spotlights. Experiment with their position, color, & energy to achieve the desired effect.
4. Global Illumination: For more realistic lighting, especially in indoor scenes, consider using Godot's global illumination systems. In Godot 4, you have options like Signed Distance Field Global Illumination (SDFGI) & VoxelGI. These systems simulate how light bounces off surfaces, creating more natural-looking scenes. Be aware that these can have a performance cost, so use them judiciously.

Material Mismatches: Getting Your Colors & Textures Right

• Wrong Colors (sRGB to the Rescue): One of the most common issues is that colors look darker or more washed out in Godot. This is often due to something called "sRGB." In simple terms, sRGB is a color space standard. Most image editing software & monitors use it. When you create your textures, you're likely working in sRGB. Godot needs to know that your color textures (like your albedo or diffuse maps) are in this color space to display them correctly.
  • The Fix: When you import your textures into Godot, select the texture file in the FileSystem dock, go to the Import tab, & under the "Compress" settings, make sure the
    1 Mode
    is set to
    1 VRAM Compressed
    . Then, for your color textures, ensure that
    1 Texture > Force sRGB
    is checked. For non-color textures, like normal maps or roughness maps, you should leave this unchecked. This tells Godot to treat the image as a color & apply the necessary corrections.
• Transparency Troubles: Transparent materials, like glass or gradients, can be tricky. You might find that your transparent surfaces are either completely opaque or have harsh, aliased edges.
  • The Fix: In your material settings in Godot, under the
    1 Transparency
    section, you have a few options.
    1 Disabled
    is the default. For simple transparency, you can use
    1 Alpha
    . For more complex effects, you might need to use
    1 Alpha Scissor
    or
    1 Alpha Hash
    . You also need to pay attention to the
    1 Cull Mode
    . By default, Godot will cull (not render) the back faces of a mesh. For something like glass, you might want to set
    1 Cull Mode
    to
    1 Disabled
    so you can see both the front & back.
• Metallic & Roughness Workflows: Godot's

  1 StandardMaterial3D

  uses a PBR workflow with separate textures for metallic & roughness. Blender's Principled BSDF shader is compatible with this, but you need to make sure you're exporting the textures correctly. If you're using a different workflow, like a specular/glossiness one, it won't translate directly.
  • The Fix: Stick to the metallic/roughness PBR workflow in your 3D modeling software. When you export, you can either pack your textures or import them separately into Godot. If you import them separately, you'll need to manually assign them to the correct slots in your
    1 StandardMaterial3D
    (Albedo, Metallic, Roughness, Normal, etc.).
• Unpacking Materials: Sometimes, a model with multiple materials will import into Godot as a single object with only one material applied. This is especially common with more complex models.
  • The Fix: In the Godot editor, you can right-click on your imported scene file in the FileSystem dock & choose "Editable Children." This will unpack the model in the scene tree, allowing you to access the individual
    1 MeshInstance3D
    nodes. From there, you can go to the
    1 Surface Material Override
    property in the Inspector & assign the correct materials to each surface.

The Export-Import Dance: Getting Your Model from A to B

• Use glTF 2.0: While Godot supports several 3D file formats like FBX & OBJ, the recommended format is glTF 2.0 (.gltf or .glb). glTF is designed to be a transmission format for 3D scenes, meaning it's optimized for getting your models from one application to another with as little data loss as possible. It's the most well-supported format in Godot & is more likely to carry over your material & animation data correctly.
• Apply Transforms: Before you export, make sure you've applied all transforms to your model in your 3D software. This means applying the scale, rotation, & location. If your model has a scale of, say, 2.0 in Blender, it can cause weird issues with lighting & physics in Godot. In Blender, you can do this by selecting your object & pressing

  1 Ctrl+A

  & choosing "All Transforms."
• Check Your Normals: We'll get into normals in more detail in a bit, but for now, just know that they are CRUCIAL for correct shading. Before you export, make sure all your normals are facing the right way. In Blender, you can enter Edit Mode, select all vertices, & press

  1 Shift+N

  to recalculate the normals.
• Triangulate Your Mesh: Godot, like most game engines, works with triangles. While your 3D software might let you work with quads or n-gons, it's a good practice to triangulate your mesh on export. This ensures that the geometry in Godot looks exactly as you intended. Most export plugins have an option for this.

The Unseen Hero: Understanding Normals

• Flipped Normals: This is the most common issue. It happens when a normal is pointing into the model instead of out. This can happen for various reasons during the modeling process. The result in Godot is that the face will look black or unlit, because the engine thinks it's facing away from the light.
• Split Normals & Smoothing Groups: For hard-surface models, you often want sharp edges. For organic models, you want smooth surfaces. This is controlled by how the normals are handled. "Split normals" are used to create sharp edges, while "smoothed normals" create a continuous, curved surface. If this information isn't exported correctly, your model can look blocky or have weird shading artifacts.

• Recalculate in Blender: As mentioned earlier, the first step is to recalculate your normals in Blender before you export (

  1 Shift+N

  ). This will fix most common issues with flipped normals. You can also visualize your normals in Blender to make sure they're all pointing outwards.
• Check for Duplicate Vertices: Sometimes, you can have duplicate vertices sitting on top of each other, which can mess up the normal calculations. In Blender, you can select all vertices in Edit Mode & use the "Merge by Distance" tool to clean these up.
• Use a Weighted Normal Modifier: For more complex hard-surface models, you can use a "Weighted Normal" modifier in Blender to get better-looking sharp edges.

A Quick Word on Player Support & Community Management

Putting It All Together: A Recommended Workflow

1. Model & Texture in Blender: Create your model as you normally would. Stick to a PBR metallic/roughness workflow for your materials.
2. Prepare for Export:
   • Apply all transforms (
     1 Ctrl+A
     > "All Transforms").
   • Recalculate normals (
     1 Shift+N
     ).
   • Clean up any duplicate vertices ("Merge by Distance").
   • UV unwrap your model properly.
   • Consider triangulating the mesh on export.
3. Export as glTF 2.0: Use the glTF 2.0 exporter. You can choose to export as a .glb file (which packs everything into a single binary file) or a .gltf file with separate textures. The .glb format is often more convenient.
4. Import into Godot: Drag your exported file into your Godot project folder.
5. Set Up Your Godot Scene:
   • Create a
     1 WorldEnvironment
     node & add a sky & lighting.
   • Add
     1 DirectionalLight3D
     ,
     1 OmniLight3D
     , or
     1 SpotLight3D
     nodes as needed.
   • Consider using global illumination for more realistic lighting.
6. Tweak Your Materials:
   • Select your imported color textures & make sure "Force sRGB" is enabled in the Import dock.
   • For models with multiple materials, use "Editable Children" to assign the correct materials to each surface.
   • Adjust your material properties (transparency, cull mode, etc.) as needed.

Conclusion