nCaching hair

You can speed up the playback of your nHair simulation by creating an nCache. An nCache file stores the resulting data from a solved nHair simulation. When you playback cached hair, Maya no longer needs to calculate all of the simulation data. Instead, Maya reads the data contained in the specified nCache file and plays it back. nCaching your hair simulation has the following benefits:

• You can play the simulation more quickly and scrub back and forth through the scene using the Time Slider.
• You can re-use caches so that you do not have to solve at render time.
• Control and the direct a simulation by arranging, merging, and blending its nCache clips.

You can create nCaches for your hair simulation from the nCache menu in the FX menu set , and edit them from the Attribute Editor or the Trax Editor. For information about working with nCaches in the Trax Editor, see Work with nCache clips.

In some instances, you can improve cache playback performance by turning on the Disable Follicle Anim attribute. See Improve nHair simulation and cache playback performance.

Related Topics

• nCaching Overview
• cacheFile node attributes