How many prims are you using for making hair?

Well I just started out creating hair in SL. I was wondering how many prims are you using to make it? I don't want to overdo it as I don't want my hair to be responsible for an even higher lag. An "over the thumb" number would be nice to know.

Hello Az,

Anywhere between 20 and 250 (yes I know...it is evil, albeit very pretty).

It really depends on how good of a designer you are, and how elaborate you want the style to be.

Since the torus is the epitome of evil when it comes to lag, try to use other shapes instead as much as possible.

It takes a lot of planning when creating a style and ensuring that your prim count stays down, but once you get the hang of it, I'm sure you'll make fab *low lag* designs.

If you have any questions I'll be back in-world around Nov 3 and I'd be happy to answer any questions or whatever else you may need.

Best,
~Ari

It annoys me that hair stylists keep using tons of prims for a hairstyle. You can accomplish a look just as good using a tiny number of prims if you just texture cleverly. I think the best hair is done with an alpha texture to fade out the ends and apply it to flexi cylinders.

You mean there are people who DON'T make hair this way?
/wink



Best,

~Ari

Thankfully, yes The trouble with having 32bit textures on hair prims is that a bunch of them together can give you that horrible alpha-shifting flicker, which to me isn't pretty. I try to stick to styles that use a non-alpha'd texture and just taper the prims to a point. It doesn't look right for every style, but for those that can get away with it I much prefer that to weirdy flickering hair.

Hello Az! I do not make hair myself, but I like to buy it a lot of it even so I had a quick look in-world at some of my favorite hairstyles, and they were all between 40-70 prims, some even going as low as 26 prims. Low-prim hair is not only possible, it can also look pretty darn good!

While alpha textures do have flicker problems when stacked, clever use of alphaed textures can be a huge asset for doing more natural-looking hair, for example if you use them selectively for doing a fringe or bangs.

It's true that they have flicker problems when stacked, so don't stack them. Excepting certain chunky short hairstyles, you don't need mutiple layers of textured prims. Just paint the image so that all the hair is on one texture.

Frankly, I don't just consider static appearance when judging if something (hair, clothes, whatever) is well made. It also has to work well with SL (ie. be efficient.) Anyone can make a 100+ prim hairstyle that looks nice, the best builder makes a nice hairstyle that's also efficient.

I was having a bit of fun there...yes the 32bit bug is a bugger.

I use the 32bit sparingly for that reason in the front. I cannot tolerate the flickering, it just looks horrid.

Best,

~Ari

Thanx for the answers. So I will see I get along with around 50.

Still - I think I will have some more questions and will get back to you ingame Ari.

I look forward to meeting you Az and seeing what great things you come up with.

Best,

~Ari

This seems like the perfect thread to ask this question.

I'm very interested in the mechanics of creating hair. I just visited Gurl6 which has an extensive selection.

Is hair created within SL using the sandbox object creation tool? (Ok, I'm a newb. Please don't hit me ).

Can anyone describe the steps needed or possibly a link which describes how to make hair? Not that I plan on going into business, but I would like a little experience with it for a Second Life article that I am writing for an online gaming site.

Totally off subject: I'm also trying to get myself educated on games that are available within SL including the scripting challenges if any of making avatars make physical moves like swinging a light saber. Any links or info would be appreciated. Feel free to PM me.

Thanks so much in advance!

There is a serious misconception over the amount of prims vs lag. Most LAG is caused by internet connection and or your graphics card. Its called RENDERING. If you graphics card is not up to par, you will NOT be able to RENDER a high amount of prims fast, hence SLOW DOWN, not lag people....

Lots of prims does not cause persistent lag, but creates a great deal of lag when the data is streaming to you. In other words, while lots of prims don't cause lag once they are loaded, they cause considerable lag while downloading. Think about how when you tp somewhere you often have to wait forever for stuff to rez. Isn't that wait annoying? My screen sometimes freezes as soon as someone with lots of prims (hair, jewelry, armor, whatever) shows up.

Contrary to what some people seem to believe, LL didn't set prim limits on land just to screw with us. They limit the number of prims in a sim because too many prims hurts.

...plus, hair is usually made from lots of torii (toruses . I believe that torii are among the more difficult prims for graphics cards to deal with.

Thus, lots of hair means lots of torii means slow response when the hair goes by...

Go to my shop Nuclear Boutique and get the free ponytails. They are modifiable so you can disect them and see the different settings used for the different prim mutations. Just make copies first so you'll always have an original.

The ponytails are VERY basic, nothing fancy so they will give you a starting point.

Torture the different prims to see what you can do with it so when you're designing a style you'll know what prims to use and if the idea is even viable with the given limitations of shapes.

Here are my very basic steps to making hair:

1: Get bald.
2: Stand on posing stand
3. Create a hair "base" that will cover most of your head and act as the foundation of the hair.
4: I have sketches of my designs, so I know what needs to be where as far as what style prim goes on the bottom...middle...top..back..bangs...etc. blah blah blah
5: Get off of the posing stand when done with the style
6: Link prims together (Drag select then Ctrl+L) and give the wig a cool name.
7:Texture it...wear it and adjust it so the next time you (or your customer) wears it there will be minimum adjusting needed.

There are many tricks..short cuts and such you'll pick up along the way and you'll be able to know how to make a piece for a bang or a flexi without having to do much once you've done it for a bit.

A bit of advice...have a small prim that will act as the parent or main prim (the yellow one when they are all linked). Make sure this prim is 0,0,0 in the rotation options in the edit menu. This will help you to level the style the first time you where it if you have a starting point.

Bad texture will destroy a style! Practice texturing and understand that not all of the prims in one wig will be textured the same. Play around with your texturing options to learn how to move the textures around the individual prims to line up the highlights, soften the edges...yada yada.

I'm sure there are more things I could tell you to get you started...but it's late and my memory fails me.

Good luck! Let us know how it goes.

Best,
~Ari

Ari,
Great info! I was gone on work all last week and then Thanksgiving. I'll definitely give this a try. I'm not clear on use of the object maker. Do they call that the sandbox or is it any poser?
Thanks! I'll report back.
-Eureka

Hello Eureka!

(That's a great show btw).

I'm not sure what you mean by "object maker."

The sand box is an area where you can build things, not a private location such as where you live..or where someone else lives.

If you're talking about the posing stand, it's an item which, when stood on, your av remains still and you can torment prims and jab them into yourself to make attachments (or adjust attachments).

Or are you talking about the Edit menu? That's the menu that pops up when you use the "Build" button on the bottom of the screen. You can build, edit the object/prims, edit terrain..etc.

Am I close??

Kind of like charades...but not really.

Let me know if you need any assistance!

I may be working on some new hair styles this coming week...if so, you are welcome to come by and watch me torment prims into beautiful and stunning creations of flowy hair

Best,

~Ari

Hi everyone, I'm trying to learn how to make hair and I really appreciate the info. Can you tell me where I can get the posing stand? And how much would I have to pay for it?

Gave you one in-world.

~Ari

I disagree. Its graphics rendering. I had a friend over back in Sept, they also play SL. Their laptop is top of the line and with a top of the line graphics card, my pc is great but i know i need a better g card for sl. I played SL on their computer and OMG. its rendering people lol. I was truly amazed. I would laugh when this person says they dont lag.. and you know what.. they dont cause 99 percent of "lag" is rendering....... rendering for those that dont know.. is how fast your graphics card can draw the graphics. when an avatar pops in that has 200 prim hair, if your graphics card is NOT strong enough, your frame rate will drop conciderable...

And what a nice surprise that was for me as I was stumbling around in the dark. Thank you so much.

I did it! I made hair I like. I selected all the prims and ctrl+g grouped them and then took the group into my inventory but now when I try to attatch it to my head I get the message that it can't attatch multiple objects. Do you know where I messed up and what I can do to fix it? I put the texture on the first prims and then when I duplicated them using shift-drag the dupes had the texture on them. I don't see what that would have to do with it but I'll mention it in case it does. Thanks if you can help me.

CONGRATS!

There is a bug that has been interferring with attaching things...or items you try to attach suddenly get sucked into the black hole where the missing socks go and are never heard from again.

Duping prims with textures is a normal. Every prim starts out with a texture anyway (albeit a rather dull one).


I have never used Ctrl+g...I use the ctrl+L to link all of the prims...that makes them one object since you can only attach one object per point on your body at a given time (and I forget how many prims allowed per point....anyone??? Bueller?). Could that be it??? Just a thought...

No worries, it should all be sorted out soon and you will look FAB-U-LOUS!

I want to see a pic when you get to wear it


You are so very welcome. Glad I could help.

Best,
~Ari