Fastest way to do fur?

computersandmore

I've got an alien character who has a (very fine) layer of downy white fur. How would I go about creating this? It only needs to stick out on the head/face, forearms, and backs of hands. Everything else will be under clothes.

BeeMKay

Get yourself the newest BETA version of DAZ Studio. It now comes with strand hairs: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/326996/dforce-hair-as-well-as-strand-based-hair-and-the-strand-based-hair-editor-in-public-beta#latest

computersandmore

How do you get the beta version?

Richard Haseltine

https://www.daz3d.com/daz-studio-beta

computersandmore

Looks like that would update me to the beta and I do not want that. I want to keep my stable version.

Any other ways? I just need to give my character the appearance of white "peach fuzz". Surely that can't be that hard with what Daz already has in the stable version can it?

BeeMKay

You can install the beta and the stable version side by side. They co-exist.

For more information, check out: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/326831/daz-studio-pro-beta-version-4-11-0-366-updated#latest

WendyLuvsCatz

computersandmore said:

Looks like that would update me to the beta and I do not want that. I want to keep my stable version.

Any other ways? I just need to give my character the appearance of white "peach fuzz". Surely that can't be that hard with what Daz already has in the stable version can it?

Well you could buy LAMH

computersandmore

Is LAMH easy to set up for something like this? I just don't want to jump into a huge learning curve just to add a little fuzz to someone. Otherwise, sure.

WendyLuvsCatz

computersandmore said:

Is LAMH easy to set up for something like this? I just don't want to jump into a huge learning curve just to add a little fuzz to someone. Otherwise, sure.

Not as easy as Garibaldi but that’s no longer available now DAZ has integrated it into the beta you don’t want to install, and both won’t work in the same scene AFAIK

both have their strengths though, I love AM’s animals

L'Adair

computersandmore said:

I've got an alien character who has a (very fine) layer of downy white fur. How would I go about creating this? It only needs to stick out on the head/face, forearms, and backs of hands. Everything else will be under clothes.

How are you with an image editor? (Photoshop, Gimp, CorelDraw, etc.)

If you feel up to the challenge, you can follow along with this video tutorial to paint hair onto an image which you can then use to add the hair to the figure via a Geometry Shell.

Basically, you use a template of the face and arms, (Genesis 3/8—other templates may be needed for older generations,) and paint the hairs where you need them. The image needs to be black and white as this will be a map for the Cutout Opacity. You can use a white background and black brush, or vice versa, but the final image needs to be white hair on a black background. I recommend you create the map at 4K or 8K resolutions while painting the hair, and then size it down to keep the most detail in the map. Save these file with all layers intact. You'll undoubtedly want to tweak it to get the right look.

To make life easy on yourself, create a small black image, 512x512 pixels is more than enough for this.

To use:

1. Select your figure and go to the main menu.
2. Click on Create->New Geometry Shell…
3. Select the Geometry Shell in both the Scene tab and the Surfaces->Editor.
4. Apply the Iray Uber Base. (I'm assuming you're using Iray. If not, skip this step.)
5. In the Surfaces->Editor, select all the material zones of geometry shell.
6. Type "Opa" in the filter at the top of the right column to isolate the Opacity settings.
7. Click on the small image square for Cutout Opacity, (Opacity Strength in 3Delight,) browse to your small black image and Select. (This is not the only way to hide unused zones of the shell, but it is easy. And it's equally easy to change the image if you want to add a zone back in.)
8. Select the Face material zone in the left column.
9. Repeat Step 7, but locate your newly created black and white map for the face.
10. Select the Arms material zone in the left column
11. Repeat Step 7, but locate your newly created black and white map for the arms.
12. Type "bump" in the filter at the top of the right column to isolate the bump settings.
13. Repeat Steps 9 and 11, using the corresponding black and white maps to create a bit of height to the hair.

You'll need to tweak various settings to get the right "white" and gloss settings, but it's quite doable. The really good thing is you can go as crazy as you want, and do the whole body, as the geoshell follows the contours of the figure. If you put in enough bump and mesh offset, there could be a bit of poke through, but it doesn't sound like you need anything that extreme.

Here's a quick sphere I treated as the instructions above, though the image I used isn't hair. The sphere is black, the geoshell is red. Click to enlarge.