Hi, I recently started using Unity3D and I was wondering how to make colors and hair to a mesh. I can make these things on my mesh in Blender, but when I export to Unity they don’t show up. So, how can I add hair to my character and add color to my character (for eyes).
Thanks.
You could UV map it and then make a 2d texture of it somewhere like photoshop, then add the texture to the mesh in unity.
Idk about hair, im just a starting too.
I also started using Blender as well =P So that means I’m not familiar with UV mapping and such. I have Gimp, which is a free version of Photoshop, how exactly would I do this?
Thanks =D
This is how hair is done in gears of war http://udn.epicgames.com/Three/CreatingHairUsingAlpha.html
The other choice is paint hair on a transparent background, then do the same technique of using planes and build up the hairstyle.
Those are the ways hair is done in games inside a modeling app hair is done by using a particle system.
To add colors I assume you mean textures, so you need to do UV mapping then its just applying or painting images onto the UVWs.
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=UV+mapping+basics
Okay, but I used particles to make hair in Blender, however, they do not show up in Unity. Can I fix this, or is hair basically done all in Unity using its particle system?
hair is done completely separately using hull style meshes and bones. Particles have nothing to do with hair in realtime games.
Here is a very decent tutorial on how to do realtime hair for games: http://www.cgarena.com/freestuff/tutorials/maya/lowpolyHair/index.html
Saved to an alpha map they are how epic renders out hair sheets. They use the hairfx plugin for 3ds Max. So in essence particles are the backbone for certain hair creation methods.
Ahh, I see. So is their a way to do this in Blender? I just started using Unity and Blender, but I know some of the basics.
Thanks.
yes a similar method to the gears of war hair technique can be done in blender its just a matter of rendering particle strands to a plane. After that set up a camera top down orthographic, and render out those strands, save the alpha map and from there it is the same thing. I have done a similar technique with grass. In fact oblivion used a similar technique with the leaves of their trees.
Your engine needs to support it, and particle system is really misleading, for what is just a bunch of polys. Unity’s particle system in this context would be the worst possible road to go down.
The vast majority of games use hull meshes, shaped meshes to resemble hair, which is mapped onto it in various layers. They then move with bones (see just about every game on planet earth in the last 10 years).
Its the exception not the rule, to use a dedicated particle system like epic does. It will no doubt become more popular as the result is stunning, but I think for unity it is much more cost effective in terms of performance to go the traditional realtime hair route - because you need engine level support to pull it off at similar framerates.
Epic isn’t using a dedicated particle system in fact once it comes down to it the technique is nearly the same as the one you posted for Varga the dominance war entry. The particle system is not rendered in real time, its just a saved image of the strands of hair the particle system created. The reason to use this method is just personal preference a similar result would be just painting hair in photoshop. I dont think the OP really is fully understanding what either of us is talking about however. I think he wants to try and bring a blender particle system into unity which cant be done.
Okay, I understand some of this (I understand the colors and UV mapping now) though the hair thing is still confusing me. So, particles from Blender cannot be used in Unity, so do I use polygons to make hair or render particle strands to a plane (which I have no clue how to do)? And is alpha maps the same thing like UV maps? Sorry for my numerous questions, but I’m learning =D
Thanks.
Render hair particles from blender into a 2D texture. Make the hair polygons on your model, use the hair texture you created from blender and UV map it accordingly to these new polygons.
Alpha maps are transparency.
Use a camera system in blender that is set to orthogonal. When your render comes up you should be able to save the resulting image as a TGA and use that in photohop/gimp to make your texture. It will retain the alpha (transparency).
How do I render hair particles from Blender into a 2D texture?
Click the render button. Save the image.
I would make the hair as polygons with an alpha texture. Dynamic hair is fine for rendering, but not yet for games / real-time.
Interesting. I know how to make textures now, however, making hair is hard to do with polygons! I might have an idea, but are there any more things I can do with a polygon in Blender, like I know how to grab it, extrude it, scale it, and rotate it, but are there any more things I can do to manipulate a polygon? That would make things a bit easier =D
Thanks.
Make one polygon that will hold about half a handful of hair, texture it, then duplicate that polygon around the head with slightly different rotations. I’m not sure how Blender does this, but there has to be some option to scatter / duplicate along the head.
Ahh okay I get it, thanks! =D
This will give you an idea, this is the main character from Uncharted 2: