How is "hair" rendered on source?

lans

lans

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I was wondering - does source use a special shader to render hair, like the eyes? or like older games hair is a texture?

I know the HL2 character models are using textures for hair, but is it otherwise possible to render realistic fur/hair in source?
 
Your comp wouldn't be able to handle the, what, 300k+ hairs on a human skull.
 
lans said:
I was wondering - does source use a special shader to render hair, like the eyes? or like older games hair is a texture?

I know the HL2 character models are using textures for hair, but is it otherwise possible to render realistic fur/hair in source?
Click to expand...

That would require absolutely huge amounts of processing. I doubt it's something someone would want to implement into a game engine at this stage, otherwise no one will beable to run the game because of an aesthetic feature. Bad idea at this stage, really.
 
It's possible because of the shader model (they coul use the shader Pixar made for Scully's hair if they really wanted), but what actual path is used isn't known.
 
KagePrototype said:
That would require absolutely huge amounts of processing. I doubt it's something someone would want to implement into a game engine at this stage, otherwise no one will beable to run the game because of an aesthetic feature. Bad idea at this stage, really.
Click to expand...

Have you seen Conker: live and reloaded?

http://media.xbox.ign.com/media/490/490304/img_2278941.html
http://media.xbox.ign.com/media/490/490304/img_2278935.html

Conker's fur actually resembles something from a pixar film, and this is a xbox game we are talking about.

I know it's CPU intensive - but was only wondering if it's possible on source. :)
 
Varsity said:
It's possible because of the shader model (they coul use the shader Pixar made for Scully's hair if they really wanted), but what actual path is used isn't known.
Click to expand...

Umm, no I don't think they could. That movie was rendered over many many days. I think like fifteen seconds of video = three hours of processing time or something like that.
 
i dont think the "hair" is rendered individually or even in smaller clumps that move together. the "hair" probably supports some kind of movement but i iagine most models in the game would have short hair the didnt need to move or hair the was static because its supposed to be gelled "hair".

p.s. just a note on grammar, you dont need these around the word hair ---> " "
and ive merely used them for the sake of continuity :p
 
lans said:
Have you seen Conker: live and reloaded?

http://media.xbox.ign.com/media/490/490304/img_2278941.html
http://media.xbox.ign.com/media/490/490304/img_2278935.html

Conker's fur actually resembles something from a pixar film, and this is a xbox game we are talking about.

I know it's CPU intensive - but was only wondering if it's possible on source. :)
Click to expand...

It's probably just a shader technique then, because rendering individual hairs on someone's head is very processor intensive. :)
 
The conker example I've given above is something that caught my attention. It's not exactly every strand of fur - but rareware has done a very neat trick to make it as though it's almost every individual strand of hair. I'm guessing it's a shader at work.
 
lans said:
The conker example I've given above is something that caught my attention. It's not exactly every strand of fur - but rareware has done a very neat trick to make it as though it's almost every individual strand of hair.
Click to expand...

Yeah, on closer inspection, it just looks like they've used a shortcut. To me, it doesn't really look like they've rendered every hair on his body, just a few to make it seem like they did. :) It probably looks more realistic in motion than on screenshots.
 
I'm sure they can. Even the Xbox can render realistic hair. (Conker's bad furday)
 
The hair is a part of the model in most models I've seen (Alyx, for example). 3dMark2003 rendered the warrior's hair in the Troll's Lair scene with a vertex shader, but it looked ridiculous. Shaders nowadays are more advanced but you'd still get a hell of a performance hit with current hardware if you were trying to render a visually accurate head with a proper number of hairs.

Fur is a completely different shader for a completely different behavior and it has been rendered fairly convincingly for a couple years. Therefore the Conker argument is inapplicable, sorry.
 
Sure, it's possible to render more realistic hair, but at a cost of course.

The ATi 9800 Pro Chimp demo uses a pixelshader to render fur. Of course, this is very short hair and probably wouldn't work with longer (female) hair.
You could also just use a special shader to give it a type of gloss that hair hass and make it reflective a bit.
 
kaellinn18 said:
Umm, no I don't think they could. That movie was rendered over many many days. I think like fifteen seconds of video = three hours of processing time or something like that.
Click to expand...


remember PIxars had rendring Hard drives and special computers. I used to do CG awhile bsack ago in 3d studio max for 6 years, air was intense but with 733 p3s it took days. Luckly my teacher got a work station but that still took awhile. It all depends on the movement. Final Fantsy: the spirits within was amazing, everything looked real.
 
Ways to do hair

image+alpha transparency mapped layered polygons, being polygons there's some degree of colision available, but the hair is still in chunks

blurred surface (motion blur effects can be used to fake "fur")

flat texture (old method, doesn't look good)

layered skin (another trick, ok in some cases but has issue's)

special shader tricks

realtime hair dynamics (wont see this for years other than very veyr basic hair made up of a couple of strands.. but can be used at that level with layered polygons + texture maps + alpha transparency to give the impression of more realistic hair.


There are other methods too.
 
lans said:
Have you seen Conker: live and reloaded?

http://media.xbox.ign.com/media/490/490304/img_2278941.html
http://media.xbox.ign.com/media/490/490304/img_2278935.html

Conker's fur actually resembles something from a pixar film, and this is a xbox game we are talking about.

I know it's CPU intensive - but was only wondering if it's possible on source. :)
Click to expand...


judging by those shots that is FMV not ingame. even with pixar style shader technology your asking alot remember pixar are just making a very long FMV and as such its not done in real time.. as is required in game.
 
Andy018 said:
judging by those shots that is FMV not ingame. even with pixar style shader technology your asking alot remember pixar are just making a very long FMV and as such its not done in real time.. as is required in game.
Click to expand...

Those are 100% in-game. See the videos for the game at gametrailers or something. :)

IGN even gave conker "best graphics on the xbox" award, this E3.
 
Andy018 said:
judging by those shots that is FMV not ingame. even with pixar style shader technology your asking alot remember pixar are just making a very long FMV and as such its not done in real time.. as is required in game.
Click to expand...
That looks way to crap to be an FMV, the fur doesn't look that good at all. It just lookes like a few textures layered on top of each-other to me (with a simple shader effect possibly).
 
"How is "hair" rendered on source?"

Well it depends if it stays true to the stage version, while the movie was "ok" I believe.....oh....wait........nevermind.
 
Haha, you're saying that that Conker-fur looks good?! It looks terrible! Ass! Shit! Crap! Horrible! Uuuuuuugly! I could go on!
 
lans said:
Those are 100% in-game. See the videos for the game at gametrailers or something. :)

IGN even gave conker "best graphics on the xbox" award, this E3.
Click to expand...


my guess is that they are using Maya or 3dmax with Shag HAir mod
 
kaellinn18 said:
Umm, no I don't think they could. That movie was rendered over many many days. I think like fifteen seconds of video = three hours of processing time or something like that.
Click to expand...
It wouldn't run of course, but it is quite possible.
 
Letters said:
Haha, you're saying that that Conker-fur looks good?! It looks terrible! Ass! Shit! Crap! Horrible! Uuuuuuugly! I could go on!
Click to expand...

Umm, you wouldn't be saying that if you saw it in motion. :|

It looks very full and realistic in motion, than in a static screenshot.
 
most of the time hair is either a texture map or a low count polygon attached to the sprites head.

hair simulation would be cool but like everyone else is saying here its crazy hard on the comp... hair simulation is on the horizon just like photo realistic graphics are coming into play now..

the conker thing characters hair is polygons not hair sprites like you find in maya or xsi..
 
kaellinn18 said:
Umm, no I don't think they could. That movie was rendered over many many days. I think like fifteen seconds of video = three hours of processing time or something like that.
Click to expand...

Actually it takes, "6 hours to render just one frame of a Pixar movie--an image that lasts one twenty-fourth of a second."

Secondly, remember the nVidia wolfman demo a while back, i think for the Geforce4, that had dynamic hair, and Fable characters have long fur also, but at this state in time probably the best bet to create "realistic" female hair would be to use multiple (ala 25 or so) small strand clusters of hair, controlled by an invisible master "hair" (also known as "control curves"), that has cloth dynamics applied, add a translucent (subsurface scattering) material to larger alpha maps, hair strand models, also with cloth dynamics, and just build up as many layers as possible while keeping the most effecient fps.
 
havent u seen the gman bink? look at his head dude
 
I just have to ask one question: What would realistically rendered hair add to Half-Life 2 in terms of gameplay?
 
the furr on the conkers thingy isnt that heavy, it used multiple layers of textures, with dots on them and then placed on top of eachother with a small gap, the more layers the longer the hair looks.. for fluffy bunny fur It works perfectly but for strands of hair it looks like shit

Here is an illustrated example how the texture thing works

http://www.remtek.net/0/EVIL/default/images/05/119.jpg

The left thing is the texture, and on the right are 2 examples with the texture placed into perpective and then stacked leaving a little room between it
 
check out the hair in soul calibur 2, its basicly just independant clumps that sway differently. if u use the right textures it actually looks quite good
 
myes.. a good texture!
but still... plastic hair?
nah, he has good hair gel
 
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