Every once in a while I like to post on this subject, for several reasons. First, because the Hair Room's potential is huge compared to transmapped hair. I'm talking in terms of flexibility and realism. So I want to encourage others in their efforts.

Second, the Hair Room is admittedly a bit of a challenge. But the more people who are using it and asking for improvements, the more likely it is that Smith Micro will continue to develop it into everything it can be.

Third, these discussions frequently draw out those who have been most successful with the Hair Room—people like Carodan, who has had some pretty astonishing dynamic hair renders—who throw out helpful tips that makes everyone better.

Although I'm gradually improving, my own biggest struggle with the Hair Room at this stage is getting a neat, predictable style so that the hair isn't either gapped or intertwined. So far as materials and rendering, I'm reasonably happy, although of course lighter hair is more of a challenge than darker hair. (Tip: make sure you check Opaque in Shadow—it really helps.)

One thing to observe is that dynamic hair by default loads with a shading rate of 8.00 (!). You need to change that if you want good renders. Also, if your computer can handle it change the thickness of the strands downward (and correspondingly, increase the quantity). My latest stuff is .15 at the tip and .4 at the root, which I think works pretty well.

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Hardware: AMD Ryzen 9 3900X/MSI MAG570 Tomahawk X570/Zotac Geforce GTX 1650 Super 4GB/32GB OLOy RAM

Software: Windows 10 Professional/Poser Pro 11/Photoshop/Postworkshop 3