How to Make Animated Hair in 3D Modeling

Three-D animation has become the most popular and common form of animation, far surpassing Cel-drawn or stop-motion animation. One of the greatest hurdles faced when creating 3-D animated figures is creating realistic animated hair. The reason for this is that each hair takes up computer memory, and the more hairs the greater the usage. Fortunately, there are now programs on the market that handle these calculations more efficiently. One of these is Poser, marketed by Smith Micro. Adding dynamically animated hair in Poser is a complex process, but is doable with a good computer.

Instructions

1. Open Poser. Select the default figure in the view and delete it. Then click on the "Libraries" tab on the right. Select the "Figures" library and browse to find the figure you want to use. Double-click on it to add it to the scene.

2. Click on the "Face" camera in the camera controls on the left. This zooms in on the character's head. Use the "Move X Z" tool to pull back a bit from the head.

3. Click on the "Hair" room at the top. The interface will change to the hair room controls.

4. Click on "New Growth Group" and name the hair. Click "Edit Growth Group" and use the "Grouping" tool to select the area on the figures head where you want hair. Close the dialog. Then click "Grow Guide Hairs" and Poser will place "guide hairs" over the area you selected.

5. Adjust the "Length," "Density" "Spring" and other properties of the hair.

6. Click on "Calculate Dynamics" and the program will run a simulation of the hair. You can now pose the figure across the frames to create your animation and the hair will move dynamically relative to gravity and motion. You can also add a wind force to make blowing hair.

References

• Creating Hair in Poser 5