- Home /
What is a reasonable poly count for character hair?
I'm modelling customizable hair (change room style) for my Unity character and would appreciate a guide as to what poly count I should be aiming for.
My character is approx. 5000 triangles with multiple customizable materials ie. face, top, pants etc and so will be using multiple draw calls at runtime. In game, the hair will also not likely have any physics applied, at least not at this stage. I am targeting a web build, but I'm sure people using other platforms wouldn't mind clarification too :). It is quite simple to achieve low poly hair for short and simple hair styles, but what I am considering is longer and more complex hair styles, such as dread locks, double pig tails etc, which don't seem to look right as one solid... "blob" (for lack of a better word :) of hair.
I have been looking at the Mixamo/Evolver model hair styles which vary from 2000-5000 tris. Is this a reasonable poly count? It seems quite high to me.
If someone could enlighten me as to what figures I should be aiming for it would make the modelling process quite easier, and hopefully prevent my Unity game from being overloaded by hair! Thanks :)
I don't know the answer, but I know that those who does are going to need information about the platform you're ai$$anonymous$$g at.
2-5$$anonymous$$ is fine for a PC/$$anonymous$$ac game, your main character is relatively low-poly(for a PC/$$anonymous$$ac game), so it would make sense to downgrade the hair to match, or upgrade your character to match. For mobile, 10$$anonymous$$ for one character is an awful lot, and you'd probably have to target the latest and greatest devices only.
Thanks for the comments guys. I'm targeting a web build atm, but in the future will likely target standalone pc/mac as well. I remember the Bootcamp soldier being about 10$$anonymous$$ but having only two materials. Is 2-5$$anonymous$$ ok for a web build?
There is no big difference between standalone and web player builds. The main thing you have to care about is the loading time if your build is heavy / large / big.
Your model is enough low poly with 2-5$$anonymous$$. Don't waste your time trim$$anonymous$$g polygon count as it may lower the visual quality. Just be smart by managing correctly the (down)loading time with a shiny (and interactive) loading screen in Unity or browser.
Take a look at this, probably the best tutorial for making low-poly hair around.
Also keep in $$anonymous$$d other characters around. 10$$anonymous$$ tris (don't bother counting faces, they don't mean anything) for your main character is fine, but having a couple dozen such characters is a little heavy for any platform.