Paganeagle2001, that's something we do at the office by default. Kind of hard wired in the ol' noodle at this point, so I don't see me forgetting one but good point.  

Vilters, these figures won't be around until next year some time. The reason for the thread was to gauge interest, as I'll likely be working on them while doing all the other things I have to do at work.  So lots of time for look development, rigging type and performance abilities, props if any, etc.   between now and then. 

Good preparation is the key to succes.
Certainly if you are going to work in a rather small corner of the market.

Your figures have a special style and strong "character".

I like them.

For a vendor the success of a toon figure depends on the store you sell it at. From what I've seen, most toon figures sold here do get very little support. RDNA toon figures get good support by other vendors. Toon figures at Daz sell well, but again they get only little support. There are quite some toon figures for sale, but most of them lack add ons, except for RDNA figures. As a customer it is frustrating to buy the next toon figure and not being able to buy clothes for them.  Even the clothes converters often do not support toon figures.

 

From a vendor point of view it's a bit different. Since a lot of toon figures are supported little, it's in open market. Not like genesis or the v's where lot's of vendors operate on a too small market. But there is a another side as well. Since there is little support, people tend not to buy toon figures. Toon figures aren't a huge market for vendors, but if you create a good selection of items, it's worth it. Less customers and less vendors, I guess that evens it a bit.

 

So speaking as a vendor I'd say go for it and if it's catching on, I may support it. Speaking as a customers I'd say if you can offer me something more the just a figure at the release, I may fall for it. If it's a figure with initial clothes and nothing else, I'll pass. But if it's a figure that could morph into various figures, like the Toon Generation for example, with a nice selection of clothes, I'm sold.

I will be getting NearMe eventually, but she is the only "toon" toon that I have my eye on.

http://contentparadise.com/productDetails.aspx?id=9885

I would use her in a kawai anime version of anything not originally intended to be like that, with all of the other human/oid characters adjusted accordingly.  Not sure if I would make anything specifically for her though.

Attached Link: Free Chunk Base with Merchant Resources

Toons definitely take their own kind of marketing, but we've been pretty successful with ours. We upgrade them every year, so their universe is steadily expanding.

We opened up our core figure Chunk for free, and steadily update him (big one coming soon). He is the core character under our Toon Santa character, and we've developed add-on packs for him which sell reasonably well. We've sold thousands of copies of Toon Santa, but he's been upgraded many, many times too, and each upgrade includes a new outfit with props. Making characters tough to resist is where its at.

Your characters have a great look to them! :-)

I definiately prefer toons to realisitc generally, although I don't tend to do cel shaded type renders. Two of my favourites have been the variations on Kim Goosen's "Girl" and 3D Universe's "Toon Generations" which I actually bought specifically because they were almost exactly what I'd have had to make myself for a client, so I was quite happy that what I specifically wanted was (more or less) pre-made for me!

Toons can change their flavour quite a lot using skins and lighting - here's a December 2009 render of a version of "The Girl". So yeah, I'm always interested in toons - especially if I can see a particular use for them.

Good strong characters (like the guy in your avatar, who DOES have a hint of Delgado about him) are good - but I'm a little cautious about being TOO strong. If the character is too specific it seems to me easy for it to fail to appeal. Take: http://www.daz3d.com/shop/toon/toonimal-penguin/ as an example - for a while a bunch of toons coming out through DAZ had this "one big eye one little eye" built in to the base mesh, making it hard to do a scene using a bunch of the same figure (a flock of those penguins would look most off, for example). I'd rather the base mesh was symmetrical and odd characteristics like that were possibly thanks to rigging and/or morphs.

 

Cheers,

Cliff

First, thanks everyone for the feedback. It's made deciding to go ahead and do it that much easier.  So big thanks to one and all.

Also thanks for the kind words about my work thus far. Always nice to hear.

 

You make a very good point, who3d.  The ones I'm working on are a less stylised than my avatar (which was designed to be very stark and contrasty) and a bit more appealing over all. I am making the characters to seemingly fit in a scene together without looking like they don't belong next to each other (hopefully). 

I completely agree that, unless it helps the design/character (ie. a wooden leg or a hook for a hand), assymetry should be done via morphs/rigging. It's just easier for me as a creator to deal with and it offers a wider range of options for the user. 

To be honest I wouldn't release them all as seperate figures, rather as a morph for an already established market figure. That way you are guarenteed more sales. The only figure that comes to mind for this is the Genesis platform.  Basically all you do is sculpt your figure using the base mesh in zbrush or other 3d app, import morph, freeze erc, click auto align bones etc and you're done. Your character morph is now working. No need to start from scratch. Also most existing clothing will autofit for your figure so it instantly has a huge library. Poser users can use Genesis as well (those with poser9/pro) and I'm sure in a year, support and functionality will increase. Then again I am strictly speaking of humonoid type shapes. If your characters are something else then stand alone is the way to go. I'd release what you can on a mainstream platform, and once those sell well I'm sure the stand-alone models will follow based on reputation:) I like stand-alone figures, but unless they are supported well, they end up un-used. See this vid link below. Mec4D Shows you exactly how easy it is.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BI-a9XiXBNM

That's an interesting viewpoint and I appreciate you posting the link, it'll come in handy for those not familiar with the process. 

Sure no problem:) It's just that easy making your own morph and getting it to work.