While styling tools allow for quick and streamlined creation of complex hairstyles, a few additional steps are required for the setup. These steps and the featured tools are explored further in the braid, bun, and cornrow examples.
The Groom Workspace
The MH Groom Workspace node is the primary environment within the MetaHuman pipeline for creating and managing groom data, replacing traditional Houdini grooming operators.
The Groom Builder
MH Groom Builder is a centralized node for creating and styling interpolated hair within Houdini, offering comprehensive controls for procedural strand generation, guide interpolation, and precise density masking through textures and attributes.
It provides extensive clumping functionality, allowing detailed primary, secondary, and tertiary clumps with adjustable blending, alongside dedicated parameters for hair width, color, collisions, and refined strand styling (including frizz, length, flyaways, and spread or lift).
Additionally, it includes robust attribute management, guide data outputs, and built-in debugging tools to enhance grooming flexibility and streamline workflow integration.
Styling Workflow
Create a MH Groom Workspace node.
The internal workspace provides dedicated inputs and outputs for managing Strands, Skin, Skin VDB, and Guides, organizing all grooming operations in one central location.
Select the Source Mode - options include SOP Geometry, Groom Workspace, or Initialize New MH Head. Within the Initialize New MH Head mode, choose either MH Groom Head as a geometry to groom on, or load a custom MH Character head from the MH Head DNA folder.
Choose SOP mode for directly grooming new guides or Groom Workspace mode when interpolating hair from existing guides.
Within the MH Groom Workspace, add a MH Groom Builder node.
Select your desired Density Mapping Method, providing a density mask using the Density Attribute parameter if you're generating new strands.
Under the Strands Management tab, choose between Generate New Strands or Use Strand Input; the latter option is particularly useful for refining existing strands, optimizing grooms, and preparing attributes for export to Unreal Engine.
If generating new strands, additional controls such as Density, Root Scatter, Relax Iterations, Resampling, and Number of Neighbors provide detailed customization.
The Color and Width tabs offer extra refinement for strand appearance, while the Clumping tab allows enabling and controlling Guide, Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary clumping methods.
Further styling options, including flyaways, frizz, spread, and length adjustments, can be accessed through the Strands Styling tab.
Finally, tabs for Collisions, Attribute Management, Visualization, and Stats offer advanced refinement and attribute management capabilities.
Next Up
Braid Hairstyle
Use the styling tools to create a braid hairstyle.
Bun Hairstyle
Use the styling tools to create a bun hairstyle.
Cornrow Hairstyle
Use the styling tools to create a cornrow hairstyle.