Baking in 3D modeling refers to transferring texture or lighting details from a high-poly model to a low-poly one, balancing visual quality and performance.
Its main goal is to reduce rendering resources while preserving high-poly details, crucial for real-time applications like games or AR/VR.
Commonly transferred details include normal maps (for surface depth), ambient occlusion (for shadow realism), and color information (for texture accuracy).
In summary, baking allows low-poly models to retain high-poly visual richness, making it essential for resource-efficient 3D projects.