How do I make height based ambient occlusion work?

[TacosAndBourbon]

How do I convert my painted height to AO? I'm currenly trying to convert surface noise to ao using the filter "MatFX HBAO". When I click it, it closes the filter dialog but doesn't activate anything. Unsure if this is a bug, user error, or if I need to manually enable certain Substance tools.

**It looks like this forum doesn't recognize google drive links so I'm pasting the video hyperlink.  https://drive.google.com/file/d/1i3fzjvse5edpBQNgS-UmHWyELSOQQHzi

[Cyril Dellenbach · Accepted solution]

Hi @TacosAndBourbon,

Thanks for the message.

From my knowledge, the HBAO filter can't be in a mask. I advise you to simply drag and drop the filter in your Layer Stack, and make sure the AO channel is enabled in your Texture Set settings.

Regards,

[TacosAndBourbon]

Thanks a lot @Cyril Dellenbach