First let me start out by saying I'm not trying to start a fight but really trying to understand this.

Some people here have said that transmapped hair looks better and more realistic than dynamic hair. Why is that the case?

I know there is bad dynamic hair out there, but there is bad transmapped hair too.  And when I look at things like http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/details.php?item_id=37828 and other things done by adorana I have trouble seeing how this statement can be made.

So that leaves me wondering, what it is that makes dynamic hair so unrealistic and terrible looking? Is it just few people have the ability to make good hair, is it the hair shader? Or is it something else?

I personaly like both ( dynamic & transmapped hair )
here's 1 i did but lost when computer crashed
( Dynamic hair ) wish i could remember settings

i rather use dynamic for animation to make more realistic

Most people can't be bothered to follow Carodan's research. Have a look at http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=2015955&user_id=201439&member&np

He has made great progress by reducing the hair width and increasing the density, and has made plenty of stunning images, often using Adorana's hair.

That being said I find transmapped hair a very useful resource for background figures.

Adorana was most definitely an artist with the hair room that few have matched ;).

Laurie

Carodan's research? Are there some instructions here somewhere? I am definitely interested in details!

Quote - Carodan's research? Are there some instructions here somewhere? I am definitely interested in details!

Here's a thread to get you started...

http://forum.runtimedna.com/showthread.php?66116-FireFly-Lock-Up-with-Dynamic-Hair-Render

It might be easy to generalize about dynamic hair being somehow dissatisfying.  It's hard to set up and can be very slow to render.  I've been tinkering with some very simple dynamic hair for a... self-portait kind of a character.  My frizzy, bushy hair comes across fairly well as dynamic, without it being too difficult to create a basically accurate hairdo.  It may help that I look a bit like I have on my head a Tribble which is experiencing or recently has experienced an electrical shock.  :lol:

At any rate, I'm impressed with how the dynamic hair can look, whether my results are particularly realistic or not.  But it takes blanged-well forever to render that hair in some situations.

I find myself increasingly frustrated with and disappointed by all hair within Poser.  I've seen the good results others post, using trans-mapped, dynamic, fiber-mesh, any and all kinds of hair.  I've never been able to generate similarly pleasing results using any of the varieties of hair we have for Poser.  Lately when I walk away from Poser in frustration, for weeks or months, it's now prompted by bad hair.  Which maybe an improvement, because the cause used to be bad hair and bad joints.

And... I probably didn't do much, here, to address the actual question. 

Dynamic/strand hair in Poser looks bad because it just hasn't the tools to do it justice. Even adorana and carodans work is mediocre at best, which is very telling cause they are great artists. If that's the best they can do, I would say poser hair needs serious refinement.

Note that on the other side of the fence, this is what D|Studio fans are playing with:

Ghonma, can you elaborate, please? How is Adorana and Carodan's work inferior to the image you posted? What am I supposed to be seeing as different and better? I'm not trying to be difficult here. I honestly don't see any difference. If you could bee more specific, it might help.

The main difference is that of detail IMO, both in styling and in shading.

Try looking at all the little things the hair in the render I posted is doing. It's got little clumps in it, it's got areas where the hair is tufting in different directions, it thins out at the hair line in a believable manner, it flows smoothly into the beard (which is a totally different style of hair BTW) and it looks soft and fluffy like real hair.

Now look at Poser hair... it's basically all variations of bob cuts or afros with very little detail in hair structure and style. Where are all the subtle little things hair does in real life that make it look like living human hair ? Also look at how poser renders hair as if it were stiff straw or thin metallic wire (even with ridiculously long render times)

Straw? Wire? Carodan's renders are inferior to the image you posted?

Errrrrr......

It is possible to achieve photorealistic and dynamic hair in Poser. In the latest versions it even renders reasonably quickly.

(We may have different taste, for in particular I find Carodan's work to be very realistic, and completely unlike straw or wire.)

Quote - Straw? Wire? Carodan's renders are inferior to the image you posted?

Carodan's renders mostly consist of super parallel hair strands, as if the hair were made of stiff metal wire. Real hair is light and soft, it blows in the wind, it clumps together to form little hair cones, it makes tufts and you get all these stray strands that don't quite follow the main hair direction etc. All of which you can see in the render I posted. Also pay close attention to what carodan's hair looks like at the tip - it fades into this wispy wool like thing which is not at all how human hair looks like.

So, without any slam on the artist himself who is crazy talented, mediocre rsults from mediocre tools.

Quote - It is possible to achieve photorealistic and dynamic hair in Poser.

So you say, but where are the examples ?

here's a style where the hair doesn't taper to next to nothing. Yes, there are no stray strands but that's because she's all dressed up are has plenty of hair products to help prevent that. (yes that is possible in RL, I've done it)

You might also want to check out this thread http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2860943&page=1 for more examples of dynamic hair including messy, fly aways and wet.

Quote - ghonma, I'd really like to see the rest of that hair you posted. A shot of the whole head. Was that done with look at my hair?

Mec4D did it with the garibaldi plugin for D|S. I dunno if there's a full version.

Quote -
Yes, there are no stray strands but that's because she's all dressed up are has plenty of hair products to help prevent that. (yes that is possible in RL, I've done it)

Even in hair like that, note the micro detail in how the hair flows, there are all these little clumps or ropes in the hair. eg see that area where the hair is flowing down from her ear ? Notice how the hair is making all those thin little ropes ? That's something hair typically does, even if you use hair products.

And in your second render, while the hair does indeed have flyways, they are flying away with no rhyme or reason. Each strand starts from the scalp and moves to it's tip without interacting with any other strand in the head, which is why you get that straw like look.

The DS one looks a bit like porcupine quills in places, but for me, the main failing of Poser's DH is that it almost always reminds me of nylon doll's hair.. 'Wire' fits also to some degree. I'm not sure what is, you have the macro structure and then the micro structure of the individual strands. It's almost like real hair may have more tiny 'branches' and whisps coming off the shaft that soften the overall look. The micro structure would effect how the hair interacts with light and greatly influence the look, though I'm not sure to what degree this is simulated by the render engine.

Obviously, the more the better within reason, so more finer strands are best but that increases time and probably makes styling more complex. Overall, just talking about the last few examples, the DS one looks softer and fluffier - more like hair/fur and less like a synthetic substitute - personal opinion. Like clothing, a hybrid approach might be worthwhile exploring, trandmapped for the main body and dynamic for moveable parts, stray strands etc. - assuming the texturing/appearance can be made reasonably uniform.

Specifically styling & Dynamic draping options are a problem, but pretty much the whole workflow of the Hair room - way too complicated & non-intuitive. It feels like it was never really completed as a feature because systems were always too slow to use it until recently, and it's never been updated as far as I can see (except perhaps in terms of rendering).

The materials need seriously updating to to deal properly with IDL, shadowing and have to correct translucency & specularity.

Still feels like there's a basis to work on though.

As seen in the attached render, in many examples of existing DH styles we don't have enough variation in the clumping or the uniformity with which the hair falls (it looks way too much as if a lot of the hairs are all following exactly the same shape = unnatural). This is usually because they often use quite low poly skullcaps and there are very few guide-hairs representing a full head of hair.

Either some new way needs to be introduced to randomise the shapes & uniformity of the propogated hairs (the ones that actually get rendered) or to be better able to style multi-layered groups.

The problem I had with working with hair groups in the existing workflow is that you can way to quickly get bogged down with them if you're trying to make a realistic set of layers. And you can still run up against clumping issues of the final rendered hair. It'd be quite useful if after styling multiple groups you could consolidate them into a single group  for draping & fine styling.

I tried several experiments using a single hair group on a moderately high poly skullcap. Where I was attempting a long hairstyle I found the strands still draped far too uniformly unless I deliberately styled them to cross over one another, and then a resulting dynamic sim could just as easily go totally crazy as drape in a natural way. Some of the results I got from forcing randomisation in this way were very promising though. In another experiment I was using one of Cage's scripts to bake the dynamic hair following a period of styling, then continue until there was a balance between drape & style (this short style is the one in my first post above).

Hair Room needs a lot of work IMO.

I am intrigued by fibre-mesh hair, but to date haven't seen any blow-out renders with that option either. It's tended to look even more straw-like than Poser Strands in the examples I've come across so far. Although styling looks easier, it somehow lacks some of the ultra-fine detail I like in strand hair.

Links to fibre-mesh renders welcomed.

I would really like to use the hair room. Unfortunately I find it impossible to style anything. And, quite frankly, figures adorned with the hair room look a bit like they've been attacked and maimed by a mad hair replacement specialist.

Laurie

The hair room takes a lot of practice but it is worth the effort. The greatest enemy in achieving good styles is draping-don't do it for anything except long hair or your careful styling will disappear as in some of the renders earlier in this thread.

Still think it has a lot of potential though

• Fantastic work, Carodan! How I wish that you could upload that hair as a freebie ;-)

Cheers

/ Mike*

To my eyes the hair variation and style are great-but it looks like drawn hair in an illustration rather than real hair.

Quote - Dynamic/strand hair in Poser looks bad because it just hasn't the tools to do it justice. Even adorana and carodans work is mediocre at best, which is very telling cause they are great artists. If that's the best they can do, I would say poser hair needs serious refinement.

Note that on the other side of the fence, this is what D|Studio fans are playing with:

Quote -

Still think it has a lot of potential though

• Fantastic work, Carodan! How I wish that you could upload that hair as a freebie ;-)

Cheers

/ Mike*

 

 

Hi Mike - cheers - the hair in both those renders were fairly straitforward adaptations of 'Shena Hair' by Adorana. Not sure if Adorana's hair is still available (was in freestuff but last time I looked the links were broken).

Yeah, Adorana's site looks like it's been closed.

Laurie

Quote - To my eyes the hair variation and style are great-but it looks like drawn hair in an illustration rather than real hair.

I think it's cause that plugin doesn't do nice hair shadows as yet, which is what gives you the illustrated look. And of course the lighting in that render is pretty flat and even so that's also adding to this. But it is beta version render so i'm hopeful these things will be addressed. Ideally we would want a hair system that is easy to style at the macro level but still allows fine detail (preferably semi automated) at the micro level, that does at least half decent light scattering and responds to IDL as well as real lights. And yes which does soft hair shadows without ridiculously long render times. How much of this the Hair room (and that plugin) will do in the future remains to be seen of course.

That's right! I went looking for that hair awhile back-no go!

Quote - Yeah, Adorana's site looks like it's been closed.

Laurie

Yes-we have a ways to go to having realistic hair shaders.

Quote - > Quote - To my eyes the hair variation and style are great-but it looks like drawn hair in an illustration rather than real hair.

I think it's cause that plugin doesn't do nice hair shadows as yet, which is what gives you the illustrated look. And of course the lighting in that render is pretty flat and even so that's also adding to this. But it is beta version render so i'm hopeful these things will be addressed. Ideally we would want a hair system that is easy to style at the macro level but still allows fine detail (preferably semi automated) at the micro level, that does at least half decent light scattering and responds to IDL as well as real lights. And yes which does soft hair shadows without ridiculously long render times. How much of this the Hair room (and that plugin) will do in the future remains to be seen of course.