Is there a better way of properly connecting a hair model to a head??

[⛧NecRoBile⛧]

I just started toying around with SFM, and there's a lot I need to learn. My first goal is to get better at posing people for pictures/posters, making them look look natural and not like they're some onryō out for vengeance. lol

Well, some of the models I've downloaded are great, but they have separate hair models from the actual model. I've recently learned how to attack items/weapons to hands, and toyed around with head swaps, but I'm curious if there's a better way to ensure the hair actually sits on the head properly.

What I currently do is move the hair to the top of the head and get it as accurate as possible, then I lock the model's neck bone to the root transform of the hair. That definitely works, but my concern is that unless I get the hair in the exact spot, it'll look weird.

Any better ways of going about it?? I mainly ask because I'm ocd when it comes to things like this. lol

[Zappy]

If the hair is intended/made specifically for the character in question, you should drag the character's animation set onto the hair's animation set in the Animation Set Editor.
This will lock each bone of the hair to same-named bones of the character, where possible.

Then go to the Motion Editor, click in the timeline, press Ctrl+A to select all time, select all locked bones of the hair, and then fully apply the procedural "Zero" preset.

This is basically equivalent to "bone-merging" in Source engine games.

[⛧NecRoBile⛧]

Oooooo, thank you, I will give that a try here in a moment. Yeah, it's a Helena model from DOA, so the hair is definitely made for her. :)

***Edit***

Hmmm, very close. The hair definitely goes on top of the head, but it's not sitting on it properly. It's like her hair is a hat, and she has it tilted forward so you can't see her eyes, kind of like a cholo and their bandana. lol

I guess from here it'll just take some more playing around with it, thanks for the tip!!! :D

[⛧NecRoBile⛧]

Well, the hair definitely sticks to the model, but when I slide the zero scale Helena looks like she was just finished off by Ermac from MK. Is there an easy way to get her particular skeleton back to normal without affecting the hair?? Once I get that, then I'll be cooking with gas. :D

[Zappy]

Originally posted by Necrobile:

- ***Edit*** Hmmm, very close. The hair definitely goes on top of the head, but it's not sitting on it properly. It's like her hair is a hat, and she has it tilted forward so you can't see her eyes, kind of like a cholo and their bandana. -

Please show a screenshot of that issue (unless doing so breaks Steam's rules with nudity being forbidden and such).

Originally posted by Necrobile:

- when I slide the zero scale Helena looks like she was just finished off by Ermac from MK. Is there an easy way to get her particular skeleton back to normal without affecting the hair?? -

Depending on what you mean, try to right-click the character's animation set, choose "Import" > "Sequence", and import a "reference" pose sequence.

Also depending on what you mean, make sure to not have the character selected when using the "Zero" preset. Only have the locked bones of "attachables" selected when using it.

[⛧NecRoBile⛧]

Zappy, thank you for your replies, I really do appreciate the help. :) I was finally able to figure it out, your advice pointed me in the right direction, I just had to fiddle with some things to get it to work.

I first locked the root transform of Helena's body to the root transform of her hair. Then, when I did the zero scale like you said, it fully connected the two perfectly. Afterwards, I unlocked the root transforms from each other, and then locked the neck bone to the hairs root transform again. After doing that, Helena can move around with her hair intact. :)

https://imgur.com/a/Faybzwb

She shouldn't break any rules here, she came with clothing. lol

[Zappy]

Originally posted by Necrobile:

- Afterwards, I unlocked the root transforms from each other, and then locked the neck bone to the hairs root transform again. -

Don't do that. If the hair is intended/made for the character, the hair would have the same necessary bones as on the character (like the head bone, unless the character itself doesn't have a head bone).

[⛧NecRoBile⛧]

I tried attaching it to the head bone rather than the neck bone, but for some reason when I turned the neck the hair would stay in place. Lemme test it again.

[Zappy]

Originally posted by Necrobile:

I tried attaching it to the head bone rather than the neck bone, but for some reason when I turned the neck the hair would stay in place. Lemme test it again.

I repeat, don't do that. If the hair is for the character, dragging the character's animation set onto the hair's animation set will lock it correctly, such that you should not be manually tampering with the locking at all afterwards.

[⛧NecRoBile⛧]

Ok, I fiddled around with it a bit more and did exactly what you said. I added the pictures to the link above.

The first one was attaching the characters animation set onto the hairs animation set. Then, I only selected the hair and proceeded with the zero scale. It gets very close, but is tilted pretty far forward.

The second one was doing the same thing, except having both animation sets selected when I do the zero scale, which makes her look like Ermac killed her. lol

So I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong, to be honest. The only way I was able to get it to work was by doing what you told me not to do. Right now I'm only working on making pictures, but something tells me doing it my way will mess up animation??

[⛧NecRoBile⛧]

OMG!!!!!

Ok, I know why it was being difficult, it was operator error. lol The one thing I didn't take into consideration was you said to only select the LOCKED bones of the hair. I kept selecting too many things. lol

Gotta love derp moments. XD

Is it still not a good idea to lock the root transform of the hair to the head bone?? Or was that more in reference to how I was getting the hair connected in the first place??

If I leave it be, the hair won't turn with the head.

[Zappy]

Originally posted by Necrobile:

- Ok, I know why it was being difficult, it was operator error. lol The one thing I didn't take into consideration was you said to only select the LOCKED bones of the hair. I kept selecting too many things. -

In your defense, "attachable" models like that often don't have extra bones that have to be "manually not selected".

Originally posted by Necrobile:

- Is it still not a good idea to lock the root transform of the hair to the head bone?? -

It's not a bad idea, but except in certain specific cases where the model is not using lighting correctly, it shouldn't matter, and thus you should just simply leave rootTransform locked to rootTransform, like it is when you drag the character's animation set onto the hair's animation set.

Originally posted by Necrobile:

- If I leave it be, the hair won't turn with the head.

Provided that the models' download(s) doesn't(/don't) have anything breaking Steam's rules (like an option for nudity), please copy and paste a link(/links) here to where you downloaded the models from, so that I can see/examine the models myself.

[⛧NecRoBile⛧]

I got it from sfmlab, and it's item 2650. Helena Douglas by LordAardvark. I'd post the actual link, but it is a nsfw model and the example picture does have nudity, so I'll try to keep proper, if you don't mind. The hair comes included with the mod, so no need to dig around for it. :)

[Zappy]

Originally posted by Necrobile:

I got it from sfmlab, and it's item - . Helena Douglas by LordAardvark. I'd post the actual link, but it is a nsfw model and the example picture does have nudity, so I'll try to keep proper, if you don't mind. The hair comes included with the mod, so no need to dig around for it. :)

Okay. Please leave a comment/reply on this thread, as I'm going to bed now and might not remember this once I wake up tomorrow. (And remember to quote this comment while doing so, in order to avoid that comment/reply being mistaken for spam or such.)

[⛧NecRoBile⛧]

Originally posted by Zappy:

Originally posted by Necrobile:

I got it from sfmlab, and it's item - . Helena Douglas by LordAardvark. I'd post the actual link, but it is a nsfw model and the example picture does have nudity, so I'll try to keep proper, if you don't mind. The hair comes included with the mod, so no need to dig around for it. :)

Okay. Please leave a comment/reply on this thread, as I'm going to bed now and might not remember this once I wake up tomorrow. (And remember to quote this comment while doing so, in order to avoid that comment/reply being mistaken for spam or such.)

That is not a problem, have a good night and thank you again for the help. :)

[Zappy]

On the SFMLab submission in question, there's a "hair hotfix" link in the description. I have tested both with and without that "hair hotfix" installed, and I got the same result.


When you drag the character's animation set onto the hair's animation set, the hair's animation set should now have "lock" symbols beside these bones:

Body:
rootTransform
ValveBiped.Bip01_Pelvis
ValveBiped.Bip01_Spine
ValveBiped.Bip01_Spine1
ValveBiped.Bip01_Spine2
ValveBiped.Bip01_Spine3
ValveBiped.Bip01_Spine4
ValveBiped.Bip01_Neck1
ValveBiped.Bip01_Head1

Unknown:
Genesis3Female
hip
unusedmot01-head001

(Note that the control groups and control group names may be different for you, depending on your local "sfm_defaultanimationgroups.txt" file.)


It's important that you select all of those bones and no other bones when you use the procedural "Zero" preset.
After you have done that, the hair should now be properly attached to the character. You may optionally want to click on the "cursor" icon to the left of the hair's animation set, so you won't accidentally select the hair instead of the character in the viewport.

From now on, provided that you don't manually tamper with the locks at all, the hair will stay properly attached to the head in all poses, as long as you don't move the "unusedmot01-head001" bone of the character or any of the locked bones of the hair.