UI

Hair Tube Builder UI

Info

• Displays the layer name of current selected curves.

S-M-L

• Size of the UI. Small, Medium, or Large.

Refresh Button

• Sometimes a layer is deleted or when a new Maya scene is opened, click on this button to refresh the layer list so it can pick up correct layers in current scene.

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Toggle Curve(s)

• Curves On Top : Display curves on top of hair tube geometries

• Geometry Tubes - Hide : Set visibility of the hair tube geometries off

• Geometry Tubes - Template : Set hair tube geometries to template, this is good for if you like to trace hair strands to match imported models like AI generated model, or 3D scans.

• Reset Visibility : Reset visibility back to default

Isolate Strand(s)

• Isolate selected strands or layers.

Preview Shader Toggle

• Choose between Lambert, Blinn, Phong, Surface, or Ramp shader. Please do not edit the color in the shaders as this will not reflect on the layer color swatches and can cause unwanted behavior.

• Create New PFX Outline On Selection - with strand curves selected, applies a new PFX outline node.

• Remove Assigned PFX Outlines - with strand curves selected, removes the assigned PFX outline node.

• Delete PFX Outlines - opens a UI where we can select existing PFX outline nodes and delete them.

Geometry/Curve Selection Mode Toggle

• When lock is green , geometry selection mode is active.

  • activating geometry selection mode will allow you to view UVs easier in the UV editor.

• when lock is red , curve selection mode is active.

PFX Draw Tubes

• Opens the PFX Draw UI that allows drawing with a tube preset.

Create:

• Creates a layer:

  • When curve(s) are selected, clicking on this button will create a new layer and a tube will be created

  • When multiple curve(s) are selected, you will be prompted to choose either create one layer for all curves or, a separate layer for each curve.

  • When nothing is selected, clicking on this button will create an empty layer.

Strand Editor

• This is the main control window for the tube strand.

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Copy

• Select a curve (or strand geometry if in geometry selection mode) to copy the curve setting

Paste

• After a tube strand is copied, 'Left Click' on the Paste button will display several pasting functions.

  • Paste All - paste everything (Except for the aim settings).

  • Paste Only Shape/Crease - paste the shape (including all profile curves), and crease settings.

  • Paste Only Attributes - paste only the strand control parameters.

  • Paste UV - paste only the UV settings (and the UVs).

  • Select Custom Paste Options - will open a window and you can choose which attribute/parameters to paste.

    • The "Path Curve Spans" option isn't available and this because pasting spans on curves can cause dramatic change to strand shape (imagine, a curly strands where it needs 30 CVs to hold the shape, and pasting from a strand that only has 5 CVs will cause undesired look). If a rebuild is required, please use the curve rebuild function from Maya, or from the Curve Tool Kit.

Duplicate

• Select a curve, (or strand geometry if in geometry selection mode) and click on this button to duplicate a strand. Duplicated strand will be put in the same layer as the original selected curve.

Mirror

• Left-click on the Duplicate button will give you the option to mirror across x, y, or z

Lattice

• The Maya Lattice function enables you to adjust groups of geometries using a 3D grid. To use this tool:

  • Select the strand curves (or strand geometry if in geometry selection mode).

  • Click on Lattice -> Create Lattice (Or the option box to customize the Lattice).

  • Once modifications are complete, select all curves (or strand geometry if in geometry selection mode) and click 'Bake Lattice.'

  • If the lattice nodes remain after baking, select them in the outliner and delete them.

Smoothing

• Enables the strand subdivision preview on selected strand curves. (This is the same function as hitting the default Maya hot key 3). This function is for previewing the tube strands if you have crease geometry set.

• If you are on geometry selection mode already, simply hit 3 will do.

Normalize

• Run a smooth operation to selected curves (or strand geometry if in geometry selection mode) so the CVs on the curves will be more evenly spaced out.

Delete

• Cleanly delete selected tubes (or strand geometry if in geometry selection mode). Please delete a tube by using this button instead of the 'delete' key on your keyboard.

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Layer Bar

Layer visibility

• Like Maya Display Layers, turn on/off tubes in that layer. When multiple layers are selected, all will be toggled.

Layer Lock

• Like Maya Display Layers, set template/lock on tubes in that layer to keep them from being selected. When multiple layers are selected, all will be toggled

Color Swatches:

• Change the color of tubes by clicking on the color swatch.

Layer Name:

• LMB on the layer name button itself will select all strand curves in this layer.

• Ctrl + LMB on the layer name will allow you to select multiple layers.

• Shift + LMB will allow you to batch select layers in their display layer orders. (Only for Maya 2023 +)

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Layer Utilities

The tool comes with Visibility, Lock and Up/Down buttons: Toggle all layer Visibility ON Toggle all layer Visibility OFF Invert current layers Visibility states

Toggle all layer Lock ON Toggle all layer Lock OFF Invert current layers Lock States

Move selected Layer(s) Up Move selected Layer(s) Down Move selected Layer(s) to the top Move selected Layer(s) to the bottom

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Extract

• Extract Selected Strand(s) - Makes a duplicate of strand tubes from selected strands.

• Extract Selected Layer(s) - Makes a duplicate of strand tubes from selected layers.

• Extract All Layer(s) - Makes a duplicate of strand tubes from all layers.

Delete Layer

• Delete Empty Layers - Delete all layers that do not have any members in them.

• Delete Selected Layers - Delete all selected layers (highlighted in the layer manager).

• Remove All Layers - Delete all layers and the setup.​

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Strand Editor

This is the main control for the corresponding tube geometry of a selected strand curve.

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Strand Name Bar

• shows the name of current strand curve (default name will be something like "xgt_tube2_group1_masterCrv1". Clicking on this bar will select both the strand geometry and the curve.

Presets

• Presets allows you to save a strand's settings, so it can be reused in the current scene or a new scene.

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Profile Curve CV Edit Window

• Modify your profile curves in this window, you can display the profile curves.

Shape:

• Click the Shape button to view and select from various profile curve shapes. Choosing a shape will apply it to all profile curves root, tip and middle curves, overriding any existing shape.

• Custom Selected: to apply a custom shape:

  • The custom curve need to be positioned at the origin [0,0,0]

  • The custom curve need to be 'closed' curve.

  • To use a custom curve. Import your curve first, make sure it's a closed curve. Then, make sure the strand editor is displaying the desired hair tube strand. Finally, select the curve you imported, and and then click on 'Custom Selected'

  • You can also grab a default period curve by going to the Main UI > Menu > Create Default Root/Tip Curve

Add/Remove Point

• To add more edge loops to the profile curves, simply click on this button, and click anywhere on either the root or the tip curve.

• To delete a point, hold down Control + Left Click and drag, you will see highlighted CVs while dragging, releasing the mouse button will delete the CV.

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Profile Curves

• Show All: Display all profile curves in the Profile Curve CV Edit window.

• Even Out: Space out middle curves evenly within 0 (root profile) to 1 (tip profile) position.

• Remove All: Removes all middle profile curves.

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Path Curve CVs

• Changes the CV count on the path curve.

Strand Controls

• Subdivision: Controls the length subdivision.

• Scale: Controls the size of the strand. ​

• Scale X: Controls the scaling in the X-axis of the strand.

• ​Scale Z: Controls the scaling in the Z-axis the strand.

• Lock Curve Length Influence:

  • When enabled, the strand geometry will align all the way from root to tip of a curve.

  • When disabled, you can choose a percentage to apply to the strand.

• Length %: When Lock Curve Length Influence is disabled, you can enter a percentage for the strand.

• Rotation: Rotates the strand based on the ramp.​

• Twist: Twists strands around the central curve axis. This setting needs to be coupled with the twist ramp.​ ​

• Offset X: Moves the strand in the X direction from the center axis.

• Offset Z: Moves the strand in the Z direction from the center axis.

• Offset Rotation: Spins around the tube strand using the center of the tube as the center axis.

Crease Controls:

• Crease Geometry Checkbox

  • ​When this is on, the tool will automatically apply a crease operation to the tube using the CV index numbers in the Crease CVs box. To avoid slowing process, turn this checkbox off during strand adjustment, and only turn it back on when ready to apply creases.

• Crease CVs: CV index list for creasing.

• Set: Sets CV list from selected root curve CVs

• Add: Adds selected CVs to existing CV list.

• Remove: Removes selected CVs from existing CV list.

• Clear: Clears all CV index from the Crease CV list.

UV Controls:

• Auto UV Checkbox

  • When this is on, UVs will automatically be re-applied if there are any subdivision or shape type changes. (Copy/Paste, Shape Type selection, subdivision slider change). To avoid slowing process, turn this checkbox off during strand adjustment, and only turn it back on when ready to apply UVs.

• UV Seam:

  • ​UV seam is based on the CV selected from either the root or the tip curve. To change the UV seam, select a vertex on either the root or the tip curve, and click on Set/Refresh UV

• ​Set/Refresh UV:

  • Clicking on this button will run an auto unwrap function. The result will be based on the current UV type and UV seam option that is set to.

• UV Type:

  • None - default of all hair tube created will be set to None. The UV will be there, but it will most likely to be undesirable until you set the UV type to one of the following.

  • Stripe - Automatically unwraps the tube strand so the UV is a long rectangle from top to bottom.

  • Grid - Automatically unwraps the tube strand so the UV covers the entire 1 to 1 UV space.

  • Unfold - Automatically unwraps the tube strand so the UV is more organic. This is done using Maya's Unfold function.

  • UV retaining : at the moment, UV retaining is only supported when in Stripe or Grid mode.

Aim Curve Controls:

• Aim Curve Offset: When a strand is created, it automatically calculates the aim position so that the strand is always facing up. This can be a value of 0.5 or -0.5.

• Use Given Normal: Default is set to off. For more complicated curves that twist, or curls around, twisting geometry can occur. In this case, you may want to use a custom normal to fix the issue.

• Toggle Aim Curve: To further adjust the facing orientation along a strand, you can also display the aim curve and move the vertices.

• Reset Aim Curve: resets the aim curve back to its initial state.

Advanced Controls:

• Sampling Accuracy: Sometimes if you see a 'twisted', or 'pinched' tip on tube strand, set this parameter lower to fix the issue.