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I'm trying to get my hair particles to distribute evenly across a surface of a object.

The problem is that there's only three ways to distribute particles: Verts, Faces, and Volume. My mesh surface is not even in terms of vertices or faces, and volume just makes the objects go inside my mesh.

Is there any other way to do this?

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  • $\begingroup$ Please post a screenshot of your settings. $\endgroup$
    – GiantCowFilms
    Aug 16, 2014 at 13:21
  • $\begingroup$ You might need to retopologize your mesh $\endgroup$
    – someonewithpc
    Aug 16, 2014 at 14:47
  • $\begingroup$ I'd try and shrinkwrap an evenly subdivided plane onto your mesh and add the particles to that. Make it invisible to the camera so only the hair shows. $\endgroup$
    – MarcClintDion
    Aug 16, 2014 at 21:20
  • $\begingroup$ As an alternative you may want to look at Dupli Faces. I find it much more suitable for really even distribution. $\endgroup$
    – hypers
    Mar 24, 2017 at 9:42

4 Answers 4

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So first I made a really messy mesh and added a Particle System with settings that shows dots instead of hair because this shows the uneven distribution more clearly.

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Next I added a cube then applied a Sub-Surface Modifier with 3 iterations. I also scaled it up so that it is completely outside of the mesh that it will be shrunk to.

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Now I used the Shrinkwrap Modifier to fit the new mesh to the messy one. You can already see that the particle distribution is much more even. I also used the Make Links tool Ctrl+L -> Modifiers to copy the hair particle system over to the new mesh.

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I kept the modifier on and activated it's button for "Show Modifier while in Edit Mode" and also "Apply Modifier To Editing Cage during Edit Mode". They are right next to the Modifiers other visibility buttons. Now I used the Smooth Vertex tool to even them out. You can press F6 to bring up the interactive pop-up window for the Smooth Vertex tool and increase the number of iterations for smoothing until the extra sphere's quads are more even. I also scaled this sphere using the Scale by Normals tool Alt+s so that it would be slightly below the surface of the model the hair is being applied to but if I recall correctly, there is a way to make the hair proxy object invisible while keeping the hair itself visible, I'll look that up when I get back and edit this post if I find how to do that.(Unless someone else posts that first)

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To finish it off, I subdivided the mesh one more time and set the Particle Emitter to Verts because Faces was leaving obvious clumps.

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  • $\begingroup$ best idea so far (+1) $\endgroup$
    – stacker
    Aug 17, 2014 at 9:39
  • $\begingroup$ ah! To hide the Emitter there is a checkbox labeled Emitter under Particles->Render, just uncheck it. For a persons head it would not matter much to shrink the Emitter out of sight but for animated animal fur this would cause trouble. $\endgroup$
    – MarcClintDion
    Aug 17, 2014 at 20:24
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Independently from the shape of your mesh you could achieve a more even distribution of particles by creating multiple particle systems. First you would create multiple Vertex Groups based on the area.

E.g this mesh has very small faces, medium and larger faces:

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  • Decide how many particle systems you need.

  • Select a face with a typical area size, add others with Shift-G Area add them to a vertex group

  • Repeat the process for all required Vertex Groups

  • Create the same number of particle systems as you have vertex groups and assign them as Density

  • Adjust the number of created particles until you're satisfied.

Here the numbers are 150 (outer), 43 and 22 (inner ring)

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You can also influence the emission by weight painting:

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Testfile .blend

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  • $\begingroup$ Weightpaint Mode does the same as assigning vertices to a Vertex Group, except it allows for a more fluid workflow; Just like Sculp Mode does the same as Edit Mode. $\endgroup$
    – someonewithpc
    Aug 16, 2014 at 21:27
  • $\begingroup$ @someonewithpc Hm, how would you assign values between red/blue to parts of the weight map by only assigning a vertex group. Sculpting creates new geometry, I don't see how this compares to weight painting. $\endgroup$
    – stacker
    Aug 17, 2014 at 9:39
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If you set the distribution to random, and check the random check box, they will spread out evenly. When it is set to jittered, each face gets the same number of particles. The only way to spread them out in jittered is to have all your faces be the same size.

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  • $\begingroup$ No that still hasn't fixed it. They just randomly spread across the object. I'm looking for an extremely organized pattern. Is this even possible? $\endgroup$
    – meed96
    Aug 16, 2014 at 17:17
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You will still need an organized and even mesh but you can get one hair particle per vertex this way.

  1. Set the Particle System Emission Number to be the same as the number of Verts that your object has.
  2. Under Source in the hair settings set Emit From to Vertices.
  3. Then still under Source uncheck Random Order box.

If you use children it randomizes things again.

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