If anyone reading this has put some serious time into the new Carrara 6 dynamic hair module and has either given up in frustration ....or.....had breakthrus, would you possibly visit Daz forums to read my greivance and contribute, for better or worse?

http://forum.daz3d.com/viewtopic.php?p=1008634#1008634

Can't/won't go to Daz? Can you comment here?

Thank you,
:::::: Opera :::::

I love the hair module - it does take some playing around to figure out what works best for your needs, but worth it. The shader room will add a lot to the experience. The only thing I wish for is better close-ups. Even when I ramp up the number of hair to max I get "plugs" at the hairline. To fix this I add two or three hair props to the model and hope for better coverage. When the skin and the base hairs are the same color - it helps to hide the "plug" look. Sorry, I don't go the daz forums much - I like this forum better, it allows for cross-application discussion.

I actually printed out the Hair section of the Help. Quietly read it through. Made notes. Then did a few test exercises following the print out.

I was amazed at how easy the whole plugin worked.  Maybe you need to take it quietly like I did--I am not much into hair, but I think this plugin is as good as any, of any type, in any app. A first class effort by the design team.

well, I am not going to repeat the entire experience the occured the last days, as chronicled at the Daz link.....

But suffice it to say I found the main source of my grief, an undocumented FUBAR that if you do not clean out the DazTmp folder, by hand, if it gets up to a certain point, it wrecks your current work. I am furious about that existing and even more that newbies are not notified about it.

So, the problem with my upsetness was not that I did not proceed carefully and learn meticulously, it is that the app itself was dysfunctional.

But that having been settled, I of course like this hair module. I think it is great and I am considering it for some serious filmmaking.

It has problems, however. The most critical of these: guide hair poke thru, even if collision is on. Can either of the two responders here speak to that problem? How did you work around it?

::::: Opera :::::

Thanks for the Tmp folder tip--but can you explain why this is connected to doing hair in Carrara please?  I dont use DAZ studio or Poser for other than a  basic object resource file--once an item is taken from those I never return.

.Sorry I can not be of any real help. I just went through the basic learning process so I would not have to start from scratch when I needed it.

Sorry, I did not understand what you mean by this:

Sorry I can not be of any real help. I just went through the basic learning process so I would not have to start from scratch when I needed it.

As for the temp thing....my intensive shakedown of the hair module caused the temp folder issue to come to the fore. I pretty sure there is something directly related to the hair itself causing both more orphaned items in that folder, and also new simulation work with hair causing crashes specifically because of the accumulation in that folder.

::::: Opera :::::

The first thing relates to the hair poke through you asked about.

Temp thing!----Are you saying the Carrara (not Daz) Temp file gets full when working with the hair? (I have many GB allocated to the Scratch Disk and could not, ever, believe this could get full!)

regardless of how you learned....do you have any experience with hair poking thru mesh, even though collision is on, and how do you get around this problem?

::::: Opera :::::

With regard to the temp folder issue, a veteran Daz/Carrara guy clued me when I asked this question:

What is the The DazTmp directory? Is that something I should fuss about?I

it's located in 'My DocumentsDAZ 3DDazTmp' on XP by default, right next to the 'Carrara 6' directory. That's where Carrara saves any temp data. manlystany has reported problems with not cleaning it out, and I have found this to be true as well. Cruft tends to build up there, and it causes random problems if you don't clear it out periodically. I'm lazy, so I don't do it often enough. I keep meaning to replace the shortcut to start C6 to a script that will clean the temp dir first, but I haven't gotten to that either

As soon as I was told that, and emptied and kept emptying it, my problems with the hair module ceased. Conclusion: hair module causes file build-up in the DazTmp folder, and in addition the buildup in that folder causes Carrara 6 Pro to crash and burn when using the hair module.

::::: Opera :::::

"it's located in 'My DocumentsDAZ 3DDazTmp' on XP by default, right next to the 'Carrara 6' directory. That's where Carrara saves any temp data. manlystany has reported problems with not cleaning it out, and I have found this to be true as well. Cruft tends to build up there, and it causes random problems if you don't clear it out periodically. I'm lazy, so I don't do it often enough. I keep meaning to replace the shortcut to start C6 to a script that will clean the temp dir first, but I haven't gotten to that either"

It's a strange world--I found those two files. BOTH EMPTY!-----what have I not been doing to create the problems you and Manley are having?

I don't know but thank your lucky stars!

I had many simulations, drapes, renders and shader changes that I deliberately aborted. Then....I had some that were involuntarily stopped by a frozen C6. After that, problems escalated, more and more crashed simulations, etc., and no one could help me until the above message.

At one point I completely reinstalled Carrara. Did not help, until I emptied that folder.

If you get any funny business from Carrara, check that folder!

::::: Opera :::::

I had no really "funny business" with Carrara 5.1. and, to this point, 6.02 seems pretty good other than a couple of bugs that are on the accepted list to be fixed.

If you look at Manley Stanleys posts he seems to have more problems than the whole Carrara community combined. I am beginning to think it is a work ethic/method/proceedure that is contrary to we mortals!

A concept to ponder on maybe?

I didn't even know there was that file there. It is empty too. Don't know it helps any but I don't have DS installed.

The way Daz is taking over everyones computers with placing files all over your system, needlessly, . I would not be surprised if it has something to do with thier combined software.

The only reliable fix will be the one you make, as your suggestion. Daz is making it a habit of getting users to develope workarounds so they don't have to bother fixing it themselves.

The DazTmp folder fills up with aborted/crashed simulations, I believe collectively from Physics and hair, and in the future, cloth.

If you are patient enough (or have a computer that calculates fast enough) to let the simulations finish, it will not fill up that quickly.

Also, if you render to animated images (gif) then the file will end up there also.

The program should NOT leave a temp file in that folder when the user deliberately aborts a sim. It should respond to a voluntary abort with a cleanup of that file. A program that forces you to not abort a sequence that is going wrong, or that you realize you have to change a setting, and is going to take 4 hours to complete.....is broken. 

Meanwhile, I understand that if an app crashes or freezes and you have to force quit..there's going to be an orphaned temp. Everyone in 3D knows that and we ought to be trained to find them and toss them in the trash.

So find your DazTmp folder. Keep it empty.

::::: Opera :::::