I was wondering if anyone could enlighten me on the subject of adding Custom morphs to a hair model. I'm using poser 8, is it possible there? or is there another program that would be easier? if anyone could please suggest something or point the way to a tutorial that would help, i'd be really grateful. Thanks!                                  
                                                                                      Arah

I've done tons of custom hair morphs for hairs I've purchased.  Almost every hair misses something specific I need.  (This is not criticism towards the merchants at all, they can't include everything. )   I've added curls, or custom morphs to fit a specific figure, or to make hair fit more closely to a figure, etc..

My two best friends are magnets and the morph tool.

Magnets are great for making big changes, like movement.

The morph tool is really good for making more detailed adjustments.. (easier for that than magnets imho)

I don't have any tutorials right off the bat though. I kind of learned it slowly on my own. Anyone else have any good morphtool or magnet tutorials?

Hello... this is actually an easy tutorial to find, it's the first video tutorial on here... it's by biscuit and it explains how to make hair morphs (wind, etc) with Poser magnets... It is very helpful...

Link:  http://www.renderosity.com/mod/videopro/index.php?View=Y&video_id=274

Also if you're willing to pay for something that may otherwise take a while to accomplish, you can buy this really cool product called TotalHairCntrl... it's amazing! Only 9 dollars too... :D

Link:  http://www.renderosity.com/mod/bcs/index.php?ViewProduct=69913&vendor=kaposer

Hope this helps! :D

I've got total hair control. It does work really well for bigger changes.   It really depends what you need to do.

Thank you Very much!

PhilC has a good video tutorial on the general use of magnets "An introduction to Poser Magnets", there is also a text based version.

Thanks!

ok i followed biscuit's Tutorial and it worked great, but when i tried to load the hair into Daz Studio, the Morphs won't work. are the poser magnets only for poser? or did i miss something?

I'm gonna guess that you're using a pmd file... there's a free script somewhere for DS to recognize binary morph files... maybe somebody can give us a link.

1. Export the entire hair object as wavefront obj (check the "Include existing groups in polygon groups"). [This is so that it will keep the materials and groups.

[Here you have 2 options, the first will be in step 2A and the second in step 2B.]

2A. [Only if hair is a hair prop] Select the hair prop and go to the properties tab. Click on "Load Morph Target" and browse for the morphs obj you just exported. Now name it and click okay, if all went well it should be there. Now just save the hair in the Props folder [not the Hair folder if you are going to use it in DAZ]. It should work now as long as you remember to put the original geometry in the right place and all that.

2B. [Only if hair is a figure] Download Pozers Little Helper from http://home.online.no/~kjellil/Index-AllStuff.htm... once that is there you can use the tutorial to set up a project file. Now another good program to download is Morph Manager, from http://www.morphography.uk.vu/utilities.html {scroll down to MorphManager}. Use morph manager to add new channels, and then the hard part is using CR2Editor {also from morphography} to change the names from IC_01 to PBMCC_01. You have to do this if you're using PLH.

Anyways once that part is done all you have to do is load the original hair geometry (ex: egghair1.obj) and then load the morph (ex: egghair_wind1.obj) and then click on the generate morph tab and change the settings then just hit Generate! After that the "Setup Injection Files" will appear, now the settings that you made while making the project files will appear and you can save the deltas, visibility files and the pose file. [note: the deltas and visibility files work better while in the same folder.]

Okay now it should work unless you changed the vertices or renamed the groups... or forgot to change the channel names like I said before.

I know this is a lot, which is why I suggest you try just saving the hair as a prop and all that first... maybe someone else has a better solution, who knows...

Hope this helps! :D

Hm Tried 2A and it didn't work, Thanks very much though, i'll keep trying just in case i missed something! :)

JUST INCASE YOU DIDN'T, here's how:

STEP 1: Go to Edit>> General Preferences... (or press Ctrl+K)

STEP 2: Click on the "Misc" tab, which will give you things like 'Temp File' location and stuff, (this is not important right now).

STEP 3: In that tab there will be a subsection that says "Save Files." Poser has "Use External Binary Morph Targets" checked on by default... you don't want this, you want it turned off... so UNCHECK IT.

Now you should restart Poser (after saving your project), then when you re-open it, you can start saving Props and Figures and Poser will NOT make a .pmd file, instead it will put the morph data directly in the file. So now they should work in DAZ...

If it doesn't you could try saving the poser project as a .pz3 (Poser file) and then open DAZ and click on File>> Import>> example.pz3.... this will open your poser scene and the hair might retain it's morphing capabilities and you could just save it in the Props folder directly from DAZ. Who knows??

I hope this helps...

That was it! it worked! Thank you Thank you Thank you!!!!!! Thank you So much!

Also a really cool tool for importing morphs is the Neterworks Morph IMP python script. Works on both Macs and PC's. Use the magnet method above. Options include full body morphs, load a single morph or a folder full of saved off morphs, remove all but the FBM dials, etc. Check it out on RDNA. I have used it to add magnet body morphs into FBM's and would kill you if you tried to take this tool away from me. :)

Forget poser hair. Use photos. I suggest multiple screenshots from flm or TV. Drab as many screen shots in as many igghts as you can of haiy as you can and superimposed on pose figures powst render. Poaer hair hair is SO poor

Forget poser hair. Use photos. I suggest multiple screenshots from flm or TV. Drab as many screen shots in as many igghts as you can of haiy as you can and superimposed on pose figures powst render. Poaer hair hair is SO poor

Thanks everyone! But since i'm working on animations mostly using PS hair isn't an option for me, but thanks anyway!