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Introduction
Hi all, as I see everyday
a lot of people asking how to make hair or whats the best way for creating
hair, etc Just here I will show a little steps how Im creating hair in Maya
using PaintFX. This tutorial contains three parts, first understanding hair
elements, second working with complete hair and third setup hair strokes.
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Part 1:
Understanding Hair Elements
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To create hair in
Maya using paintFX, you need three things, first (as I named) Hair
Heart, second Hair Path, and finally Hair Stroke, from
these three elements you can create good paintFX hair
What I mean by
these elements?
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Hair Heart:
I mean from where the hair will grow/born (come from), its simply a
curve, which you will attach the hair brush with it, you can make it
shape as you like, I used to make it circle, but it depends how is your
hair design will be.
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Hair Path:
Its your hair design, which you will animate in the future; you will
make it from curves.
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Hair Stroke:
Its the hair look and how it will be, here is the real work on the
hair will start.
Now I will start making
a single hair group, its just a way to make you start. Lets start step
by step
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You should start
with your hair design by making the hair curves (hair paths), in this
test I have made a single path, single path dont mean one hair (you
will control the number of hair from your hair stroke).
Take care when you are building your curves, put in mind that a lot
of spans will make it hard to fix the hair design in the future, by
usual I rebuild my curves in 7-9 spans.
You can use Modeling/Edit Curves/Rebuild Curve option to fix
your curves spans number.
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Then make your hair
heart, in this test I have made it shape circle, but remember you can
make any shape, its depends how your hair will born/grow. And remember
you can use one Hair Heart for many Hair Paths, so dont think you make
for example 5 hair paths that you need 5 hair hearts!
Look at
Picture 1 to know how the Hair Heart and Hair path looking for
single hair
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Picture 1: Hair Heart and Hair Path
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Now its the time
to start working on your hair stroke, the hair stroke its like a brush,
and how your hair will look, now I will show you how to connect the
hair stroke with your hair heart and hair curves, then I will show you
some hair attributes which will help in creating the hair.
How to connect the Hair Stroke with Hair Heart and Hair Path?
You have two functions in Maya you will use for this Attach Brush
to Curves and Set Stroke Control Curves.
Attach Brush
to Curves: You will use this function to connect your hair stroke
with your hair heart, and that after choosing your brush from Rendering/Paint
Effects/Get Brush You have a good hair brushes in Maya Visor/hair,
in this test I have choose hairRed1.mel.
You can find this
function from Rendering/Paint Effects/Curve Utilities/Attach Brush
to Curves.
After this step
the hair stroke has been created, and you can see it from the outliner.
Set Stroke Control
Curves: We use this function to make the hair stroke walk with hair
path, so select your hair strokes (from the outliner) then select your
hair path, and click the function, you can find it here Rendering/Paint
Effects/Curve Utilities/Set Stroke Control Curves.
Now this step complete
and we are ready to start working into hair stroke attributes.
Look at Picture
2 to see what I got.
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Picture 2: Hair Stroke connected with Hair Heart and Path
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Select your stroke
from the outliner and open it attribute, I will not show you all hair
attributes, but I will tell you the most important.
Global Scale: This is the first value you should edit after setting
stroke control curves, from this you can control you brush scale size.
Display Quality:
When you are making the hair, you should change this value always, as
you know paintFX is a bit slow.
Sample Density:
Its the samples points on the stroke, which paint your hair.
Seed: This
option sets the sequence of random numbers used for brush attributes
that are randomized.
Smoothing:
I used this a lot when Im creating soft hair.
Tubes Per Step:
Its simply the number of hair per point.
Tube Rand:
The random places for the hair in the point.
Segments:
Defines the maximum number of segments a tube can have, control the
stroke ability to walk with curve.
Picture 3 shows what I got from changing some of these values.
This is simple steps
to start working on paintFX hair, and remember you have a lot of attributes
you should test, and your way in paintFX is very long.
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Picture 3: The render after changing some
values
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Part 2: Working with Complete
Hair
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Now
I will make a simple
hair design which will made from curves (hair paths), then I will show
you where you should put your Hair Heart, then connect the hair stroke
with them. So here we go
How I can make a simple hair design in less time?
Its really a simple
way, just what you need is to create a curve, and then do smart transform
duplicate after rotating the first duplicated curve.
Lets make it step
by step:
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In the front view
I have draw a curve using CV Curve Tool, start drawing from
the top of the hair to down (top where the hair heart will be).
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Rebuild the curve
with 7 snaps, as I said we do this to make it easy to edit the hair
later.
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Use Insert key
in your keyboard to make the curve pivot in the first point of the
hair (I mean in the top of the hair), you can use any snap methods
for this, as you like.
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Now select the
curve and make a duplicate, but make sure that you have chosen smart
transform from duplicate option.
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Let the new curve
selected and rotate it 15 degree in Y direction, you can make this
fast from channel box.
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Do the duplicate
many times, until you finish the hair circle.
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Always make group
for all hair curves including hair heart, this will make it easy to
move them from place to place while animation.
Like this I have
finished the simple hair design, as you see its very simple, but put
in mind that you can make any hair design.
Where should I put the hair heart?
As I said, the hair
heart is the place from where the hair will grow or born, in this test
I have made it shape circle and I put it under the top of the hair,
you should rotate this circle 180 degree in Z direction, because you
need the hair grow to the up when you apply the brush into your hair
heart. I have used circle shape because my hair design grows from circle,
so you can choose any other shape (it depends how your hair design is).
Take a look at Picture 4 down.
Picture 4: Where the curve pivot should
be, and hair heart place
After applying the
brush in to your hair heart, select all your hair curves then select
your hair stroke and choose Set Stroke Control Curves. In
Picture 5 down just I have increased tubes per step and
sample density values.
Picture 5: Render after setting stroke
control curves
Picture 6
shows how is hair heart different from hair to hair design. Hair heart
shape depends on your hair design.
Picture 6: Two samples shows how hair
heart shape depends on hair design
In all samples here
I have created one hair heart because I have just one hair level.
What I should do if my hair is from many levels?
The best way to
fix this, is to make more than one hair heart, for example you can make
one heart for any level... In Picture 7, the colors mean levels.
Picture 7: Hair levels and hair heart
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Part 3:
Hair Stroke Setup
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The
real work on the hair will start, so I hope while reading that you open
Maya and testing Here I will make a little sample; from it you can
understand how you can setup your stroke very fast, and step by step
of thinking.
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I have made a
circular curve, and I make it a little up in the scene just because
the hair will fall down. Now go to your Visor window then hair, as
you see you have a lot of hair types, in this sample I have choose
hairBlond1.mel, after chosen apply the brush into the circular
curve, then select the created stroke and open it attribute.
(Make a render
and see the results.)
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In any hair you
create the first value you should change is Global Scale (its
under hairBlond tab), the Global Scale control the scale size
of your hair, for example if your hair is long and big in the scene,
you should change global scale value to something big, etc... In this
sample I have changed the global scale value to 10.
(Make a render
and see the results.)
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As you see, you
have a little hair, for example if you put anything after the hair
you will see it! So now we should change a value called Tubes Per
Step (you can find it under hairBlond/Tubes/Creation),
if you change this value you will get more hair in this circular curve
(in this step), in this sample I have change the hair value to 20.
(Make a render
and see the results.)
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We still in the
same problem that if we put anything after the hair we will see it!
We can fix that by changing a value called Sample Density (its
under strokeShape tab), sample density mean samples points
on the stroke, so if you change it value you will get more hair, in
this sample I have changed the value to 3.
(Make a render
and see the results.)
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If you continue
increasing sample density and tubes per step values,
Maya will be very slow, so you can go out from this problem by a value
called Display Quality (its over sample density), I can give
you here some tips, if you feel Maya going slow try to decrees
display quality value, and while setup-ing stroke no need to make
render every time just change the display quality value to
100%, finally if you finish all your hair just make display quality
value to 0%.
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Now we are making
a soft hair, so how we can make this hair more softness? There is
a value called Smoothing (its the last in strokeShape
tab), in this sample I have choose 40.
See Picture 8,
just to be sure what I got.
Picture
8: Hair Stroke setup
As you know the
tutorial name is getting start, so I will not tell you all stroke values,
but here Im telling you the steps of thinking when you are building
your hair and setup-ing your hair stroke.
Now its the time
for changing the hair color, you can make all hair color effects from
hairBlond tab/Shading, you have a lot of values there, so its
your time to start testing.
Now my favorite menus in hair stroke attribute its Illumination menu,
from this menu you can make a cool hair light effects.
Then the Shadow Effects, from here you can setup your hair shadow.
Then the Glow menu, its really very nice, you should try it.
Finally here the Tubes menu, I think if I make new tutorial I
will start from here
Picture
9 shows rendered complete hair from hair heart, path and hair stroke,
and the look after little setup.
Picture 9: Rendered completed hair
This is all what
you need to start creating paintFX hair, and this is just the start,
you have many things need to learn...
If you have any suggestions/corrections/questions in paintFX hair you
can post it in CGTalk.com forum in this thread
here, where I have started this tutorial or you can email me at
eyad15@yahoo.com with email title
"Maya PaintFX Hair Tutorial: Getting Start" or something like
that
Finally thanks for
reading and good luck...
- Eyad (eYadNesS)
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