anybody know of tutorials on exactly what this does on certain maps, by this I mean, I would like to know exactly what abient occlusion does, does that bring out texture better? I also have heard the term diffuse and then there is also color, is there a difference becuase not sure if a beauty pass makes texture look better like a sharpen filter in photoshop etc.
AFAIK a beauty pass is just a full lit render, without separated render passes/layers. I usually do one as a reference even when rendering layers and passes.