Hi! Well been messing with Z-Toon and thought I'd see if it worked with rendering in Max 3.1! It did... I think it looks pretty good... not exactly like P5 toon shaders and all that but it looks cartoony! Please let me know what ya'll think! Talk later! G

Attached Link: http://members.fortunecity.com/ghel30/poserstuff/walk2.zip

6 sec clip... it's really bad... threw it together really quick, just wanted to see how animation looked ztooned in max http://members.fortunecity.com/ghel30/poserstuff/walk2.zip

I've got vue - would it work in vue? roughly how did you do it? love esther ps it looks great!!

I'm not sure about Vue... I've never used it... sorry. I just did my scene (ProPack), used ockham's ztoon python script (thanks ockham, your python scripts are priceless!!), saved scene, hosted scene in Max, made certain my camera was alligned with my z-flattened V3 and happily rendered away! I just used Max's default lights and no shadows... I tried it with an omni with shadows on but it just darkened it up and there were zero shadows. And it took way longer to render. With the default lights it took 20 minutes to render the talking part of the clip @ 1024 by 768. Sorry again about my lack of Vue knowledge. Ask the good dr geep... or maybe we have some VueGurus here too. Thanks for your input! G teh 0R1G1N@L G_MAN!

It sounds interesting. I don't know if that ztoon python script will work with mac. I'll try and find it and see. I think it should theoretically work in vue but im not sure about how I will align the axis. Love esther

It should work in vue if vue can import scaling, you could try it out and see.

ghelmer, I don't know if Max 3 has this feature, but check out your "advanced effects" rollout under your light properties. If it has an "ambient only" option (check box), then that should give you the same effect as Z-tooning on any model with no shadows and should render a little quicker. Plus, you can put other lights in the same scene if you wanted, and it's not dependant on camera position. This is available in Max 5 and 6 I know for sure, but not certain about 3. Also, you might wanna look around for the 'Ink N Paint' material, but I don't think version 3 has that one either. Anyway, cool effect! Nice job.

Hi maxxxmodelz, I've used the ambient only on regular (non z-toon flattened) models before, never quite the same effect (no toony outline) but with z-toon it removes the dark outline that gives the 2d cel shaded look. "Ink & Paint" would be nice, unfortunately it was a new feature starting with Max5. Also I have Illustrate 5.0 and I've never liked its comic or cel shading effects, Posers z-toon is the most like what I would have liked Illustrate to do. Thanks eh! G

Heres with 2 lights ambient only checked. all washed out and took 5 times as long to render even with no shadows. Shadows from Max lights won't affect a flattened z-toon poser model, no depth to it.

Yes, Z-Tooning works in Vue as well (4 and 5) and the effect looks identical to what you see here. Lighting plays a big role in improving the effects. Ask this question over in the Vue Forum and maybe Agiel can provide a link to the thread where I showed how to do this in Vue 5 (its not quite the same as in Poser- but the result looks just about the same...) E-on plans to improve upon it in a future release, and you may likely see Vue's new Cel Shader in "Vue Infinite", coming out in the next month or two...

Hi Okay, thanks Veritas, well I may well get vue I. so in that case I maybe will just wait and not play around with ztooning yet since vue I. might have an easy way. Love esther

"Heres with 2 lights ambient only checked. all washed out and took 5 times as long to render even with no shadows. Shadows from Max lights won't affect a flattened z-toon poser model, no depth to it."

If you just use 1 ambient light and lower the intensity as needed, you won't have that 'washed out' effect. Intensity on the light and color cause textures to get washed out if they're set too high. Also, with the ambient light, just like regular lights, you can use falloff and range values to cut down on overexposure. I'd post an example, but I'm not at my workstation right now.

Anyway, if you prefer Ztoon, that's just as good too. The only difference is, Ztooning is camera dependant, and ambient lighting isn't. Just one ambient is all you need to simulate the same effect. :-) Message edited on: 01/26/2005 00:31

Ok, here we go. Here's EJ rendered in Max using just 1 ambient light, no shadows. Less than 1 second to render at this size. Looks just like Ztooning I think. Either way is fine I guess. ;-)

That looks great! Eternal Judy that is... Not tooting my horn about my pic!! LOL!! You're completely right! Very cartoony but just not cel shaded looking... I love Z-Toon because it creates the outlines on the models that recreate a hand drawn ink and paint look of traditional 2D animation.

Take the lovely Ms. Croft on the right: outlines and all. She was flattened by z-toon. Ms. Croft on the left was put into Max in 3D, no cartoony outlines though. It's a nice effect but just not what I was going for. I'm a BIG kid still I guess. I love 3D CGI but I'm a sucker for old school 2D. Me and my kid watch way too many cartoons!! The hardships of being a dad eh? LOL!

Message edited on: 01/26/2005 04:07

Yes I like the one on the right better too. I know where you're coming from! Love esther

Ah, yes. I see where you're at now. Ztooning gives the outline, which I hadn't noticed in the first render. ;-) You'll have to forgive me, it's early in the morning for me here. hehe