Layers
The recipe is a stack of layers. Each enabled layer becomes one hair group on the saved groom, with its own Hair Elements, Conversion, Style, Appearance, Physics, and grooming strokes.
Hair pieces still go in Hair Elements, but that array lives on the selected layer, not on the recipe root. Older recipes that stored Hair Elements on the recipe root migrate into a single layer on load.
Use the Layers panel to add, rename, enable, or hide layers. Binding, output path, hair-card LOD, preview budget, and animation preview stay on the recipe.
Hair elements
Every enabled element on a layer is welded into one source mesh before tracing, so they do not become separate grooms. The strand budget is shared over combined surface area. An element with Enabled off stays in the viewport but out of the conversion.
A piece modelled as its own object (ponytail, braid, bun) does not touch the cap. Root Detached Shells (on by default) gives every unrooted connected shell a scalp of its own at the end nearest the head.
Roots
| Setting | Current behavior |
|---|---|
| Proximity To Target Mesh | Default. A hair vertex is a root when it sits within Root Proximity Distance of the target head surface. |
| Top Slice Along Axis | Fallback. The top Root Height Fraction of the bounds along Growth Axis is the scalp. Used automatically if proximity finds nothing. |
| Roots Penetrate Band | Spreads roots over the band's area instead of parking them on the outer rim. Without this, the crown reads as a ring around a bald disc. |
| Cull Hidden Surfaces | Rejects inner-shell vertices so half the strand budget does not go to hidden hair. Leave it on. |
| Follow Surface Grain | Steers flow and root fallback paths along sculpted locks, braids, and tubes. Default 0.6; zero keeps ordinary geodesic routing. |
Preserving sculpted detail
Surface Flow reads the least-bending direction of the source geometry, including concave grooves. Ambiguous crossings receive less directional influence. Root fallback paths also favour travel along the grain, helping them follow folded locks rather than cutting directly across them.
Tracing crosses connected triangle edges continuously, keeping strands apart as they pass over folds. Crown samples can travel through the root band instead of stopping as stubs. Flow smoothing reduces blending between different lock directions. Curve smoothing limits movement from the traced path and returns it to the source surface.
Surface Flow > Flow Guides accepts optional root-to-tip point arrays for a braid, coil, or individual lock. Place points on the source in groom space, in centimetres after the Hair Element transforms. Set Influence Radius to the lock width. Each guide claims its own region by distance along the mesh edges, so a disconnected nearby lock does not inherit its direction. Editing a guide rebuilds the flow.
Flow Guides steer extraction. Simulation guides remain controlled separately by Groom Build. A guide cannot recover hidden connections that the source mesh does not contain.
Surface Flow concentrates its Points Per Strand budget where a straight segment would miss the traced curve, while keeping the original endpoints. Raise the budget for tight turns and compare the saved groom with the source from the side, back, and above. A reduced preview point budget can hide detail present at the final conversion budget. Keep Flow Smooth Iterations low when preserving small directional features.
The report
The Report panel shows source counts, roots, generated strands, discarded strands, density, geodesic distance, and grain alignment. Use it to diagnose:
- Root Vertex Count == 0 - transform or root settings are wrong.
- Hair Shell Count vs Rooted Shell Count disagreeing - a piece is about to come out bald.
- Strands Per Square Cm below ~120 - the sculpt will show through; raise Strand Count, not Root Width.
- Large Discarded Strand Count - Min Strand Length is too high, or the mesh is fragmented.
- Low Grain Alignment - flow directions do not closely follow the estimated locks. Check Follow Surface Grain and Flow Smooth Iterations, then inspect the shape; alignment alone does not verify a braid or bun.