Workflow Overview

FollicleFX follows a clear four-stage pipeline:

1. GUIDES → 2. PRIMITIVE → 3. MODIFIERS → 4. DISPLAY

Each stage builds on the previous one.

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Stage 1: Guides

What: Create sparse guide curves (50–500) that define hair flow.

Why: Guides are the blueprint. They tell FollicleFX where hair grows, which direction it flows, and how long it is.

Creating Guides

| Method | When to Use | |--------|-------------| | Generate Guides | Most common — automatic placement with distribution control | | Create Empty Hair | Manual sculpting from scratch | | Convert Curves to Guides | Import from other software or use hand-drawn Blender curves |

Key Parameters

  • Count — Number of guides (150–400 typical for head hair)
  • Length — Guide length in Blender units
  • Distribution — Random, Poisson Disk, Grid, Vertices, Face Centers, Even
  • Control Points — Points per curve (8 is a good default)

Guide-Level Operations

After generating, you can apply guide-level operators:

  • Guide Sculpt — Edit guides in Blender's sculpt mode (shapes are preserved when parameters change)
  • Guide Add — Add new guides via the Add brush
  • Guide Flow — Pin-based flow control (direction + bend profile)
  • Guide Mirror — Mirror guides across an axis
  • Guide Resample — Change point count uniformly
  • Guide Interpolate — Add guides between existing ones

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Stage 2: Primitive

What: Generate dense strands (10k–100k+) from guides via interpolation.

Why: Guides are too sparse for realistic hair. Primitive fills in thousands of strands between them.

Key Parameters

  • Density — Strand count (start with 10k–20k for styling, increase for renders)
  • Radius — Interpolation radius (how far strands look for guides)
  • Length / Width / Taper — Strand shape properties
  • Region Map — Paint-based parting system (red/green regions)
  • Density Map — Texture controlling where hair grows

Performance

On a modern NVIDIA GPU, 100k strands generate in under 50 ms. Start low while styling, increase for final renders.

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Stage 3: Modifiers

What: Apply effects to style and shape hair.

Why: This is where you create your hairstyle — clumping, curls, frizz, braids, etc.

Available Modifiers (10 Active)

| Modifier | Description | |----------|-------------| | Clumping | Group strands into natural bundles | | Guide Flow | Pin-based flow direction + bend profile | | Coil | Spiral curls and waves | | Frizz | Noise, flyaways, randomness | | Braid | Curve-driven braided structures | | Cornrow | Scalp-attached braids with anchor strands | | Loc/Dreadlock | Dreadlocks and matted hair | | Cut | Trim strand length | | Surface Offset | Push strands away from mesh surface | | Simulate | Physics simulation with GPU acceleration |

Plus guide utilities: Guide Sculpt, Guide Add.

Modifier Stack Order

Order matters. General rule: structure first, details last.

Recommended order:
1. Guide Flow (direction)
2. Clumping (structure)
3. Coil (shape)
4. Frizz (detail)
5. Cut (final shaping)
6. Surface Offset (prevent scalp penetration)
7. Simulate (physics — always last)

Texture Masks

Every modifier supports texture masks:

  • White = full effect
  • Black = no effect
  • Gray = partial effect

Paint masks directly in Blender's Texture Paint mode.

FollicleScript Expressions

Most parameters support expressions for procedural variation:

rand3(0.6, 0.9, clump_id)     # Per-clump tightness variation
lerp(0.5, 1.0, v)             # UV-based gradient
rand(index) * 0.5             # Per-strand frizz variation

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Stage 4: Display

What: Control viewport visualization.

Why: Optimize performance while styling, get accurate previews for review.

Key Controls

  • Display % — Show a percentage of strands (lower = faster)
  • Color Mode — Material, Random, Clump ID, Length, UV, Root-to-Tip
  • GPU Acceleration — Faster modifier evaluation when enabled

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Common Workflow Recipes

Straight Hair

Guides → Primitive → Frizz (subtle, magnitude 0.5) → Cut

Wavy Hair

Guides → Primitive → Clumping → Coil (Wave mode, count 2-3) → Frizz

Tight Curls

Guides → Primitive → Clumping (high tightness) → Coil (Helix mode, count 6-10) → Frizz

Dreadlocks

Guides → Primitive → Loc modifier

Wet Hair

Guides → Primitive → Clumping (tightness 0.95) → Frizz (very low)

Braids

Create curve path → Braid modifier → Primitive → optional Frizz

Cornrows

Draw curve on surface → Cornrow modifier → Primitive

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Performance Tips

| Stage | Tip | |-------|-----| | Styling | Use 10k–20k strands, Display % at 50% | | Preview | Use 50k–80k strands, Display % at 100% | | Final render | Use 100k–300k strands, all modifiers at full quality |

Enable GPU Acceleration in Display tab for faster modifier evaluation.

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Next Steps