Play a hair simulation

To see how hair and dynamic curves react when forces are applied to them, play the simulation. To make changes to the hair system or follicle attributes while the simulation is running, use Interactive Playback.

To tweak the hair simulation, adjust the Stiffness, Iterations, and even Gravity attributes in the Dynamics section of the hairSystemShape. The Damp value can be adjusted to relax oscillating curves on non-straight hair. See Dynamics.

Note

There may be performance issues with playback if output is set to NURBS curves and the number of curves is high. As a workaround to provide faster interactive feedback, create hair with output set to Paint Effects and NURBS curves, and hide the group containing the output curves. Then in the hairSystemShape, set the Hairs Per Clump to 1 and the Clump Width to 0.

To play the simulation

Increase your frame range, for example, to 1000.
Select Hair > Display > Current Position.
Click the Play button to play the simulation. Watch the hair react to dynamic forces as the simulation plays.

To play and interact with a hair simulation

Increase your frame range, for example, to 10000.
Select Solvers > Interactive Playback.
Interact with the hair simulation while it’s running, including modifying dynamic hair system and follicle attributes, as well as transforming the surfaces to which the hair or dynamic curves are attached to see how the hair behaves.
Click the Stop button to stop the simulation.