Kristinka or Melena?

[Hirazi Blue]

As you all well know, it seems the classic "XSI Hair" is slowly but surely being superseded by hair solutions made with and for usage with ICE. First there was "Kristinka C" and now studioNest has introduced "Melena".
Now my question is this: is there anybody out there, who already tried them both and would like to comment on their respective complexity, learning curve, ease of use (and all the other notable differences/similarities not yet noted here)?
I personally really would want to dig into one of these two packages, but it's terribly hard to make a good choice as they both look very tempting, yet both also look a bit too complicated (but that could just be me, I know...)

[Mathaeus]

Well it's not to me to talk there, but anyway - Kristinka Hair is built with many nodes from 'mt_Strand_nodes_Samples' that Helge posted on old SI-Net. That is about structure, styling concept is a mix of my own ideas, habits, (very limited) possibilities... And honestly I didn't hesitated to kill compatibility, modularity, if I felt it's needed. For example, almost all non-factory compounds are embedded just because I found that people don't like to install them... NURBS as emitters are there to provide stable deformations even without any simulation, and... to avoid painting the weight maps (UV can be used instead).

There are many convenience nodes, built-in smooth step interpolations, built-in density sliders... guides and hair are separated because is easy to hide the one you want, just by pressing 'H' . Fur is using fast, Polygon Reference Frame together with a few tricks to fix inaccuracy, instead of slow, but 'correct' Point Reference Frame...

So, for learning purposes, or if you want to build your own system, don't go with Kristinka, please ....

About Melena hair, from what I read from docs, looks like a very extended mt_Strand_nodes_Samples, together with a very interesting, new hard-coded nodes. One day, if I upgrade to newer Softimage, it would be great to create a new 'creative chaos' with this one

[Kerro Perro]

Hello Mathaeus (Anto?)

Now nearly two years later than this thread i have the same question as Hirazi and am curious if you would still answer the same way.

I basically want a stable(ish) system to make furry characters with a bit of dynamics (some swaying would suffice) and would like to use maps to set colour and length etc.

I'm very tempted by your kristinka 3.0 and the nice docs and samples as i find melena a little more inscrutable (plus the docs are offline for some reason)..

Any thoughts? Thanks in advance!

[Hirazi Blue]

Melena docs -> local backup at rray.de in the zip file "melena.zip"

[Kerro Perro]

Ah thanks, even has two examples, nice!

You have any thoughts on the matter Hirazi? Have you tried either (or hopefully both...)?

[Mathaeus]

Hello Mathaeus (Anto?)

Now nearly two years later than this thread i have the same question as Hirazi and am curious if you would still answer the same way.

I basically want a stable(ish) system to make furry characters with a bit of dynamics (some swaying would suffice) and would like to use maps to set colour and length etc.

I'm very tempted by your kristinka 3.0 and the nice docs and samples as i find melena a little more inscrutable (plus the docs are offline for some reason)..

Any thoughts? Thanks in advance!

I have both installed (or exactly, some predecessor of Melena) Btw I've released first Kristinka Hair only because in these times, mr. Mathee disappeared from public forums for a while. Almost all what I knew about all that stuff in these days, comes from his tutorials. In these few years, Kristinka Hair might be example of 'clean economy' : I never asked anyone for money, no one offered money. Clean zero.
What I wanted to say, I think it's impossible to take only some extensions to ICE, and start with comparisons, without taking the entire ICE into account.
Maybe you'll be able to adapt some example from kH pack, but when problems begins, everything goes back to 'mother ICE' .
Same for tutorials. According to all related questions in these years, I never had idea *what* to put in possible tut, still keeping it reasonably short.

Anto

[Kerro Perro]

Hello Mathaeus (Anto?)

Now nearly two years later than this thread i have the same question as Hirazi and am curious if you would still answer the same way.

I basically want a stable(ish) system to make furry characters with a bit of dynamics (some swaying would suffice) and would like to use maps to set colour and length etc.

I'm very tempted by your kristinka 3.0 and the nice docs and samples as i find melena a little more inscrutable (plus the docs are offline for some reason)..

Any thoughts? Thanks in advance!

I have both installed (or exactly, some predecessor of Melena) Btw I've released first Kristinka Hair only because in these times, mr. Mathee disappeared from public forums for a while. Almost all what I knew about all that stuff in these days, comes from his tutorials. In these few years, Kristinka Hair might be example of 'clean economy' : I never asked anyone for money, no one offered money. Clean zero.
What I wanted to say, I think it's impossible to take only some extensions to ICE, and start with comparisons, without taking the entire ICE into account.
Maybe you'll be able to adapt some example from kH pack, but when problems begins, everything goes back to 'mother ICE' .
Same for tutorials. According to all related questions in these years, I never had idea *what* to put in possible tut, still keeping it reasonably short.

Anto

First off let me say that i appreciatte your activity on this forum a lot, the fact that you seem "reachable" is one of the things that makes kh attractive.

Secondly i personally would gladly pay for some sort of comprehensive tutorial wich takes a setup from start to finish like a cmivfx tut. Perhaps an animated sequence of a character with long hair or a furry creature running (i would prefer second one ;) ) to me that would be great but i have no idea how many others would also, not for me to say.

But saying that i have no problem diving in to docs and sample scenes and simply just trying it out for myself - my question was more geared towards "wich system is the more suited for my goal, i.e. a furry character" but i guess the answer is (as usual) "the one you can make work for you"
(it's a bit like asking wich exercise is the best to lose weight" -> "the one you'll actually do" ;) )

Well i just better start trying them both out... i am already wondering though: how are NURBS surfaces (wich both system seem to prefer) at deforming with rig operation?
Also a line in the kh docs throws me a bit : "Point Cloud should always stay on world origin (Scale 1, 1, 1 Rotate 0, 0, 0 Translate 1, 1, 1)." Does this mean the character can not move around the scene?

[Mathaeus]

Hello Mathaeus (Anto?)
Well i just better start trying them both out... i am already wondering though: how are NURBS surfaces (wich both system seem to prefer) at deforming with rig operation?
Also a line in the kh docs throws me a bit : "Point Cloud should always stay on world origin (Scale 1, 1, 1 Rotate 0, 0, 0 Translate 1, 1, 1)." Does this mean the character can not move around the scene?

1: actually, NURBS surfaces are there just for making the 'static' shape. You can deform them, but generally this is not good idea, because of lot of distance-based calculations. Imagine a few objects shrink-wraped one after another, try to deform them all at once.
Suggested method is simuation, more about that, here
2. of course character could move... Point cloud is 'deformed', just as enveloped mesh - but SRT should be at world origin. This is somewhat usual for particles.

[Kerro Perro]

Ah ok, might have been stupid questions then but i'm very new to this stuff...

I'll check out your dynamics examples, tonight since i first posted i've been playing with melena's xsi hair to melena method and already getting some nice results, though i must say i prefer your method of setting colour through the ICE tree (i saw the kh2 point color node in the "fur from NURBS" example - must try to mix some melena and kh nodes and see if my comp catches fire ;) ), anyhoo i'm on a path now so thanks and i'll let ya know if i have more sensable questions!