How do I build up cartoonish-looking hair for my 3D character?
Answer Owen replies
While realistic, dynamic hair can look great on a 3D character, when trying to achieve a stylised cartoony look, hair modelled with geometry is still my preferred choice. Geometry hair can take a while to build, but it’s much quicker to render, requires no expensive plug-ins and with the use of a few simple modifiers you can achieve some good-looking dynamics.
By building layers of Guide geometry you can quickly block out the overall shape of your hair before adding in any detail. You can then use these guide layers to build your final hair shapes.
The graphite modelling tools in 3ds Max are ideal for this job, with the Step-build and Conform tools enabling you to easily create geometry on the surface of another object. 3ds Max’s Modifier stack comes in really handy here too: using Shell and Push modifiers fleshes out the hair in a non-destructive way and means you can keep control of the shape of the hair at the base level.