Importing Assets into Unity

Importing and applying materials to assets in Unity.

Importing Assets into Unity Video

Importing External Assets

• Drag and drop the assets from a File Explorer into the Project window. This will copy the assets into the project rather than move them.

• Alternatively, right-click on the folder in the Project window and use ‘Import New Asset.’ where you would like to store the asset

Adding a textured Material

It is strongly recommended to use textures that are to the power of 2. Examples include 16 by 16, 64 by 64, right up to 2048 by 2048. If need be, you could also use a texture that is 64 by 128 or 1024 by 2048.

• Select the Material in the project folder you would like to apply them to. If you need to create one, right click in the target folder, go to 'Create', and then 'Material'.

• Drag your textures into the box to the left of the respective category on the material.

Using the standard shader has the Metallic on the Red channel of the texture and the smoothness on the Alpha channel.

Note that if you add a normal map texture, it will come up with a warning. Make sure to set the texture itself to a Normal map texture by either :

• Click on the Fix Now when you apply it in the material or,

• Modifying the texture type on the texture itself at the top of the Inspector window.

Emissive can also use a texture, but the amount it glows is still based on the Intensity setting.

Preparing your assets

It is a good idea to set up any imported meshes to use it's target material by default. This only works if you have applied material slots to the asset in the external application.

• Select your 3D asset in the Project folder, and then look in the Inspector.

• Select the ‘Materials’ tab at the top.

• You can apply the materials in the imported slots as needed.

• Hit ‘Apply.’

Applying materials to Models

• Drag and drop materials onto the asset in the Scene or the hierarchy, this will only apply to that one asset.

• It is possible to import materials from external programs, but the easiest and best approach for this (without using plugins) is to create your materials in Unity directly. Simply name your material slots in your external application as needed, and import them.