Art Tooling

Aura’s art tools are designed for rapid prototyping. They help you explore visual ideas, create references, and quickly test concepts all directly inside Unreal.

💡 Art tools can take a few minutes to run, remember you can work in multiple chat threads at the same time (up to ~4)!

To use the tools below, make sure you’re in Agent mode first.

Image Generation

Aura can help explore visual concepts, create tiling textures, and create reference images based on text descriptions. Reference images can also improve results when generating 3D models.

Examples

• “Create an icon image for a ring of dexterity that has a green gemstone.”

• “Create a seamless tiling texture of a stylized cartoon stone wall.”

• “Create 3 image variations of a supernatural shadow entity enemy. They should be on a white background too”

Images are generated at a high quality resolution. You can specifically ask Aura for a “low resolution” image which will speed up generation time. Generated images appear as thumbnails in chat. Click any thumbnail for a fullscreen view.

If you’re happy with an image you can save it by clicking the Import button. By default images are saved in Content/Generated_Images/. You can customize the save folder in Editor Preferences (see Additional Settings).

Note: Un-imported image generations are not lost/discarded. You can find them in {ProjectFolder}/Saved/generated_images

Image Editing

You can iterate on an image with Aura by describing changes you’d like to make. Aura will create a new copy of the image with the requested edits.

💡 Since Aura is aware of all the images in a thread, when editing an image in a thread with many images, it’s useful to tell Aura specifically which image it should edit. i.e. “Edit the image of the dog wearing a tophat by adding a monocle and a bowtie”

Examples

• ”Edit this image and change the ring’s gemstone to green.”

• ”Put the ring on a white background instead.”

For more precise control, you can open any generated image in the image editing tool — a dedicated modal for in-painting and reference-guided edits.

To use it, press the Edit button below generated images in a thread. To edit an existing image, add it to chat context and prompt Aura to edit the image. It should show up in the thread with the Edit button below it.

In-Painting Canvas

In-painting allows you to use a painting canvas with a brush-based interface to mask specific areas of the image for targeted edits. The model attempts to preserve details outside the masked area.

To use it:

1. Use the brush to paint a mask over the area you want to change.

2. Type a prompt describing what should fill the masked area and hit send.

3. Preview the result, then click Accept to save it to your chat thread — or paint a new mask and try again.

Reference Panel

The Image Edit Tool has a reference panel on the side where you can load an image to guide the Style, Pose, or Subject of your edit.

• Paste image data directly to the active reference panel indicated by the blue outline.

• @-mention a texture from the Unreal Content Browser, or drag one in (in-editor Aura only) — it will automatically route to the active reference panel indicated by the blue outline.

• Or click the upload button in the reference panel to pick a local file.

• Or pick one from the Generated / Art Direction tabs below the panel (see below).

You can hold up to 5 references per category and 15 in total. References can be dragged between categories, and individual images are capped at 20 MB.

Generated tab

The sidebar's Generated tab lists the images Aura has already made for this project — everything in {ProjectFolder}/Saved/generated_images, including un-imported ones — so you can reuse a previous generation as a reference without saving it out and re-uploading it.

• Type in the filter box to narrow the grid by filename.

• Click a thumbnail, then choose Style, Pose, or Subject to add it. Added images are marked so you can see what you've already used.

• The newest 300 images are listed, and 100 are shown at a time — narrow the filter to reach older ones.

This tab is always available and needs no setup. It refreshes as new images arrive, so images generated in chat while the edit modal is minimized show up when you come back to it.

Art Direction tab

When Art Direction is enabled, a second tab appears next to Generated showing your reference library — the folders of concept art, mood boards, and style sheets you've pointed Aura at.

• Filter by filename or tag, so knight finds everything you tagged that way regardless of what the files are called.

• Click a thumbnail and choose Style, Pose, or Subject, exactly as on the Generated tab.

• Images you've removed from the catalog never appear here.

If the tab is missing, Art Direction is switched off — see the section below. If it's empty, you haven't added any reference folders yet.

Art Direction

Art Direction is Aura's reference library. Point it at folders of concept art, mood boards, and style sheets you already have, tag them however you like, and Aura can pull the right references into a prompt automatically instead of you hunting for the file every time.

The catalog lives in {ProjectFolder}/ArtDirection/, so it travels with your project under source control. Aura only records paths and tags — your image files are never copied or moved.

Enabling Art Direction

Art Direction is off by default. To turn it on:

1. Open Settings → Chat Options.

2. Switch on Enable Art Direction.

Turning it on adds three things: a Settings → Art Direction page, the ✨ button in the chat bar, and the Art Direction tab in the Image Edit sidebar. Switching it back off hides all three — nothing is deleted, and your catalog is still there if you re-enable it.

💡 If the toggle isn't in Chat Options at all, your organization has disabled Art Direction account-wide.

Setting Up Reference Sources

A source is a folder of reference images. Open Settings → Art Direction and click + in the Sources list (or Add your first reference folder on an empty catalog).

Each source needs a name — letters, numbers, dots, dashes, and underscores — and a path scope:

• Local to my machine — an absolute path like D:/refs/inspiration. The mapping is private to you and isn't committed. Use this for a personal reference stash that lives outside the project.

• Shared with team (project-relative) — a path relative to your project root, like Content/ArtReferences. This one is committed, so teammates resolve the same folder automatically as long as it exists at that path. No leading slash and no .. segments.

In the desktop app and in-editor, the folder icon opens a native picker so you don't have to type the path.

Scanning. Use Scan all (or Scan source when one is selected) to index new files. Aura reports how many were added. Supported formats are .png, .jpg, .jpeg, .tif, .tiff, and .bmp.

⚠️ .webp is deliberately not indexed — Unreal can't decode it, so those references couldn't be attached to a message anyway.

Missing sources. If a teammate committed a shared source you don't have, or you moved a local folder, it's flagged as missing. Click Resolve to point it at the right folder on your machine — that mapping is local to you and isn't committed.

Tagging

Tags are yours to define — there's no automatic tagger. They're what the ✨ button matches your prompt against, so it's worth tagging in the words you'd naturally type ("knight", "rocky terrain", "hand painted").

Tags allow letters, numbers, spaces, dots, underscores, dashes, and forward slashes.

To tag images:

1. Click images in the grid to select them. Shift-click to select a range.

2. In the bar that appears, click Add tags (or Remove tags).

3. Type a tag, or click one of the suggestion chips — these are ranked by how often you already use them, so your vocabulary stays consistent instead of drifting into near-duplicates.

4. Click Apply.

Images you haven't tagged or reviewed yet carry a yellow new badge in the grid — the same set the Unreviewed filter shows.

Managing your vocabulary. The Tags sidebar lists every tag with a usage count. Click one to filter to it, Ctrl/Cmd-click to filter it out, or use its menu to Rename or Delete it across the whole catalog.

Finding images. Combine the tag filters with Match All / Any, a filename search, and three smart filters:

• Unreviewed — images you haven't tagged or marked reviewed yet. Use Mark reviewed on a selection to clear images that genuinely need no tags.

• Missing — records whose file is no longer on disk.

• Removed — images you've taken out of the collection.

Removing an image. Remove from catalog takes an image out of the collection so it's never suggested again. The file on disk is untouched, a rescan won't quietly re-add it, and you can Restore it later from the Removed filter.

Adding Images as References

There are four ways an image can end up guiding a generation:

1. The ✨ button in the chat bar. Type your prompt first, then click ✨. Aura matches the words in your draft against your tag vocabulary and attaches up to 3 of the best-matching references as chips you can remove individually. Images carrying more of the matched tags rank higher. If nothing matches, Aura tells you which tags it found (or that your catalog is still empty) rather than attaching something random.

2. Bookmarking from chat. Any generated image you've Imported gets a bookmark button. Click it, add tags, and save — the image joins your catalog at its imported location. Nothing is copied; Aura just starts tracking it. The first bookmark creates a generated-images source for Aura's default import folder automatically.

3. The Art Direction tab in the Image Edit Tool. Browse the catalog, filter by name or tag, and click a thumbnail to add it as a Style, Pose, or Subject reference for an in-painting or reference-guided edit.

4. As chat context. References are also just images — you can still @-mention, drag, or paste one into chat the usual way when you want a one-off that doesn't belong in the library.

💡 The ✨ button is only as good as your tags. A dozen well-tagged hero images beat a thousand untagged ones, so tag as you go rather than in one big pass.

Model Generation

Aura can create 3D models based on text prompts and reference images.

It may take a few minutes depending on current request traffic and complexity of the request. Once complete, the model is conveniently added to your current level for viewing.

• By default, generated models are game-ready meshes with up to 20,000 triangles. Ask for “high quality” or “V3” to switch to the high-detail model, which targets around 50,000 triangles. Asking for “maximum quality” lets the model pick its own triangle count, up to Tripo’s ceiling of roughly 1.5 million. You can also set an exact count in your prompt, e.g. “face_limit=1000”.

⚠️ Higher triangle counts take noticeably longer to generate and import.

💡 Model generation is intended for prototyping and visual exploration. Assets may not be production-ready.

Examples

• “Generate a model of a magical wooden staff with a red crystal at the top.”

• After giving Aura the reference image, or right-clicking in content browser, “Generate a model based on this image”

Models are saved in /Game/AuraModelGen/{ModelName}/.

You can customize the save folder in Editor Preferences Advanced Settings.

Textures and Materials

• Textures are generated by default at standard quality. Ask for “HD textures” or “detailed textures” to get higher-resolution texture maps. HD textures use more credits than standard.

• Ask for an “untextured” or “geometry only” model to get the bare mesh with no textures. This is useful for blockouts.

• PBR materials (base color, metallic, roughness, normal) are off by default. Ask for “PBR materials” to include them. Requesting PBR always turns textures on, so it can’t be combined with an untextured request.

Examples

• “Generate an untextured model of a stone well.”

• “Generate a model of a worn leather satchel with HD textures.”

• “Generate a model of a brass lantern with PBR materials.”

Forcing a Model Version

Aura picks the game-ready model automatically and only switches to the high-detail model when you ask for it. To override this for every generation, go to Settings > Chat Options > Force 3D Model Version, turn it on, and choose v2.5, v3, or P1 (game-ready).

Workflow Tips

• Using a reference image will lead to better results. Reference images are also the best way to get a consistent style across models.

• You can specify scale in your prompt, “Generate a model of a wooden staff that’s 1.5 meters tall”

• You can also specify pivot location to be at the center or bottom of the model. By default it will almost always set the pivot to the bottom.

UV Cleanup & Retexturing

A mesh's UV layout decides how textures sit on its surface, and the layout a mesh ships with isn't always the one you want for the work ahead — whether it was generated, scanned, or brought in from elsewhere. Aura can give a Static Mesh a fresh unwrap and carry its existing textures across onto the new layout, so you can take a model further without re-texturing it by hand.

The work is split across three kinds of tool, and Aura will normally run the whole sequence for you rather than asking you to drive them one at a time:

• AutoUV — generate a fresh UV layout for a Static Mesh.

• UV check — a read-only inspection that reports on a layout's condition.

• Texture baking — reproject a mesh's existing textures onto its new layout.

Cleaning Up a Mesh

This is the end-to-end path, and usually all you need to ask for.

Examples

• "Clean up the UVs on this rock and re-bake its textures."

• "The textures look stretched on this model — redo the UVs and reproject."

Aura will unwrap the mesh onto its main UV channel while preserving the original layout into a new channel, so any existing channel such as a lightmap is left alone. It then checks the result and retries with progressively more aggressive unwrap settings until no UV triangles overlap, switching to the XAtlas method on the final attempt, which splits islands to guarantee a clean layout. Once the UVs are clean it bakes the mesh's existing textures through the preserved layout onto the new one — base color, normal, roughness, and metallic, whichever the mesh had — then builds a material from the baked textures and assigns it to the mesh.

If the layout still won't come out clean after several attempts, Aura stops and asks you how to proceed rather than baking onto a layout it isn't happy with: accept the layout as-is, fix it by hand in the editor and tell Aura to re-check, or stop there.

Checking a UV Layout

The UV check is read-only — nothing is unwrapped, baked, or saved — so it's a safe way to find out whether a mesh is ready for baking or lightmapping, or to explain why a bake came out wrong.

It reports three defects on the channel you ask about:

• Overlapping UVs — triangles whose 2D footprints genuinely overlap, so a texture or lightmap gets sampled onto more than one surface. Islands that merely touch along an edge aren't counted.

• Bow-ties — a pinch in UV space that breaks bakes and repacking.

• Degenerate triangles — zero-area UV triangles.

Examples

• "Check the UVs on this mesh."

• "Is this model ready to lightmap?"

Unwrapping on Its Own

You can also just ask for a new UV layout without the bake, and target a specific UV channel. PatchBuilder is the default and matches the editor's own AutoUV; XAtlas is the fallback that guarantees no overlaps, at the cost of more seams.

Examples

• "Give this mesh a fresh UV unwrap."

• "Redo the UVs using XAtlas."

Reprojecting Textures on Their Own

If a mesh has already been re-unwrapped, its existing textures can be reprojected onto the new layout as a standalone step, without running the full cleanup again. Each map is reprojected into its own texture, so base color, roughness, and metallic stay separate rather than being flattened together.

The mesh needs a valid UV layout before anything can be baked onto it, so this follows an unwrap rather than replacing one.

Examples

• "Reproject this mesh's textures onto its new UV layout."

• "Re-bake the base color and roughness onto the cleaned-up UVs."

Character Rigging

Aura can generate rigged character models (SkeletalMesh with a skeleton) directly from text or image prompts. Just include "rigged" in your prompt.

• "Generate a rigged humanoid character"

Characters default to an A-pose (palms facing inward), which is optimal for Unreal's mannequin skeleton. You can also request a T-pose.

You can also rig an existing StaticMesh by giving it as context and asking "Rig this model". Static meshes must be character biped assets. Rigged models are saved as SkeletalMesh assets in the same location as regular model generations. This feature is only available in Agent mode.

💡 For best rigging results, generate an orthographic front view image of a character in an A-pose first, then ask Aura to generate a rigged model of that image.

Animation Retargeting

Aura can replace characters in your game with different skeletal meshes while preserving all existing animations. Aura handles the full pipeline automatically: creating IK rigs, retargeters, aligning forward direction, and batch-converting animation assets.

• "Replace the player character with my custom skeletal mesh"

This feature has been optimized for replacing UE Mannequin-based character setups like the UE ThirdPerson template project. This feature is only available in Agent mode.

Material Agent

Material creation and editing has moved to its own page — see Material Agent.

Additional Settings

How to Change Save Locations

1. In Unreal go to Edit > Editor Preferences

2. Scroll down to Aura > File Settings

3. From here you can change the default folder for Image and Mesh Generations.