text: Q:
  
  How to create alpha / height maps in Blender for use in e. g. Substance Painter?
  
  Question
  Is there an efficient way to create images (height maps) in Blender so that they can be used as alphas in other applications like Substance Painter? If so, what's the proper way to do it? Preferrably without having to uv-unwrap.
  What I tried
  I tried various settings and came up with this, but it doesn't seem to be right for everything and I hope there's a more efficient way. Here are the changes I did on the default blend file:
  * delete lamp
  
  * camera 
  
      object
          transform
              reset location / rotation / scale, then set location z to 2
          data
              lens
                  orthographic
              orthographic
                  scale: 2
  
  * render    
  
      resolution
          x: 2048 px
          y: 2048 px
          percentage scale: 100%
  
      shading
          alpha mode
              transparent
  
  * render layer
  
      solid: true, all else: false (especially sky or else you'd get some grey background)
  
  * scene
  
      color management
          display device: none
  
  * object
  
      set scale to 0.5 for x/y/z
  
      material
          shading
              shadeless: true
  
      texture
          type: blend
          colors
              ramp: true
              color stop: set alpha from 0 to 1
          blend
              progression: linear or quadratic, depends on the effect you want
              vertical: true
  
      mapping
          coordinates: generated
          mapping
              X: Z
              Y: Z
              Z: Z
  
  * select object
  
      apply -> rotation
  
  And then render the image and save it.
  Here are the settings as graphics:
  Camera:
  
  Scene:
  
  Object:
  
  Using a cylinder as object:
  
  And the final alpha / height map:
  
  A:
  
  I finally found a good, working and as it turns out easy solution to this problem. Credits go to Petr Utinek, he made a tutorial video here.
  The steps (I modified them a bit):
  
  Create a mesh, e. g. a gear and switch to Top Ortho view
  
  Select the camera, hit space, search "Align Camera to View" and apply it
  Select Render tab, change resolution to 2048x2048 and 100%
  
  Select Data, Orthographic and adjust the Orhtographic Scale
  
  Select the Mesh and assign a Material to it
  Select Node Editor, Compositing and Use Nodes
  Add a Normalize Node and an Invert Node and link the nodes like this:
  
  add a Plane below the Mesh
  
  Render the scene and save the image
  
  Or to follow the initial question: Easy to re-use by simply e. g. deleting the gear and replacing it with a cylinder
  
  which will result in this
  
  