2 Create your hair model

The next step is to create your hair model based on the hair system you chose. You can use various software and plugins to model, sculpt, and groom your hair, such as Maya, Blender, ZBrush, XGen, Ornatrix, or Hair Farm. You can also use reference images, sketches, or concept art to guide your hair design. You should consider the shape, length, thickness, color, and style of your hair, as well as the personality and mood of your character.

3 Skin your hair to your character

The third step is to skin your hair to your character's head. This means that you have to bind your hair model to the joints or bones of your character's skull, so that the hair moves and deforms with the head. You can use different methods to skin your hair, such as weight painting, cluster deformers, follicles, or dynamic constraints. You should also test your skinning by posing and animating your character's head and checking for any issues, such as clipping, stretching, or popping.

4 Add dynamics and collisions

The fourth step is to add dynamics and collisions to your hair. This means that you have to make your hair react to forces, such as gravity, wind, or inertia, and to interact with other objects, such as the character's body, clothes, or accessories. You can use different tools and systems to add dynamics and collisions to your hair, such as nCloth, nHair, or Houdini. You should also adjust the parameters and settings of your dynamics and collisions, such as stiffness, damping, friction, or collision thickness, to achieve the desired result.

5 Optimize and render your hair

The final step is to optimize and render your hair. This means that you have to make sure that your hair is efficient and compatible with your render engine and pipeline. You can use different techniques to optimize and render your hair, such as LODs, instancing, baking, or caching. You should also choose the appropriate shader, lighting, and shadow options for your hair, depending on the style and quality you want to achieve.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?