Are there any simple ways to apply an ambient occlusion (AO) texture on top of a base color texture without using mix or math nodes?
i already have base color texture is there any other way…?
If you already have the 2 textures as image files, the only other way would be to combine them to a single texture using an image editing program.
Blender’s material editor isn’t really built to have AO plugged into the materials. AO is already a part of the render in Eevee, and Cycles has lighting that’s more realistic than AO, so there is usually no direct need for an AO texture in Blender.
However, if you do need to do it, using a mix node is about the easiest node setup you can do in Blender’s material editor except for just plugging textures in their individual slots. I wouldn’t consider using a mix node as an obstacle to my project, does it pose a problem in your case?
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Hi there,
I think if you want to add AO to any other texture, you either have to use a Mix node, or a Mix shader node (but a simple Mix in one shader sounds more logical).
What is the reason you do not want to use a Mix node to add AO in?
Cheers!
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No.
You can’t combine one source with another without using a mix / math process.
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thank you all for the help, i am trying to upload a model to turbosquid market to certify steam cell it need to satisfy some criteria such as no procedural nodes and ao is compulsory is there any way to do it
Hmm, not familiar with these criteria, but you mean they only accept baked PBR maps? Then just simply bake AO separately I guess…
Or, I completely misunderstood you 
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Looking at the stemcell specs, especially those they write for Cycles:
They say that the AO map must be present, but the Cycles page doesn’t show it plugged into the material. Maybe they don’t necessarily expect it to be used in the material and it’s enough for it to just be included in the file? Hard to tell, the instructions don’t seem clear enough.
Though, if you do want to plug it in, I don’t see anything that forbids using a mix node. They say that manipulations to textures are better done in an external software like Photoshop, but it doesn’t seem completely forbidden and I would say this isn’t really a manipulation, it’s the proper way to add an AO map in Blender.
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when i use the mix node it shows error cant use as per criteria so…i tried just adding the file to it and it worked thank you all
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