I have found also that playing with the texture percentage allows for a more/less cartoon look, depending upon what you are after. 80% seems about right for me. I like a little texture because I use SteffyZ's maps like Yuma, etc. This way you can have an "illustrated look" It has vastly improved my illustrations from Poser. I have also added in about 15-20% in the body and head highlights. This gives me a wonderful Vargas airbrushed look. I'm extremely happy with the commercial application of this pinup variation on z-toons. One other thing I've noticed about other posts is that the figures aren't as bright- as many people don't seem to be using the original SnowSultan recommendation for a single white light for full illumination of the character. However, I do use three lights myself, with light brown color tones which allows for brighter illumination and more playing around with the exact highlights effects as well. Z-Toon is a great idea and most people have not yet discovered its full pontential. A lot more will be revealed later, I think.

I for one am a huge fan of this technique. Because I am involved in commercial and fine art illustration, I know that this style of rendering is much more "salable" than photo-realism renders. Not knocking Photo-Realism, but if you want to make it really salable, turn it into retro black-and-white photography. People then think your are an artsy retro photographer! There is so much 3D in movies and TV today that the technique itself is not considered "fine art", even though it really does take a lot of technical and creative skill. Since I like making a living from art illustration, I find Z-Toons to be one of the best new ideas for commercial illustration work using Poser.

Great Models! This may run counter to your own personal philosphy, but you might want to consider doing high rez versions of some of them, especially the hermet crab, and sell them for $1.99 or whatever you like. Make a few extra Peso's to pay the website fees. Actually, you could do that with many of your models- give away low poly versions and sell higher rez versions to those who want them. What a concept! Get a PayPal account and you would make it easy for most people!

Consider getting a UPS from from APC (American Power Supply). I live in an area like that too, but the UPS's send steady clean power to your PC for up to 45 min, with never a glitch, day or night. Worst case scenerio- if power is off longer than the back-up UPS back-up battery can handle, then it will automatically shut-down or suspend, or hibernate your system, without loosing anything. I have used them for years and never lost anything. An excellent investment and much better than just a surge protector!

Wow, I feel like I've died and gone to the Beach!

I knew all the great Poser minds out there could work all these things out. The creative intelligence here is just incredible!

Hi lhiannan, Your link worked great in my Exp 6 brower. The animation looks fantastic! I knew if everyone started playing with SnowSultan's Z-Toon. further ideas and solutions would emerge. I am certain the static camera issue can also be solved too. Maybe in Python, maybe by some other clever idea someone has. I am sure this is all going to get alot more refined for Flash and Poser Cel Animation work and we are going to see some amazing new art and animation work out of Poser. Hope that DAZ is also paying attention as well. Also hope that more people create TOON specific characters. If people could start making Disney-style or Japanese Anime-style Toons with Poser, you can bet a LOT of people will using this technique. lhiannan's example is a terrific start!

Even Better- can you explain this to SnowSultan so that another great tutorial could be created around this for everyone to follow?

Hi Stewer Are you speaking of P5 or what? The virtual "Flat" Camera is the most interesting idea. Can you make this more clear for regular non-techies?

Can't have enough beach props. Glad that you and PhilC are on the case!

Great, glad that Ockham is on to this! I think this is a concept that could go really far in Poser!

Great image, and it further shows how far the Z-Toon concept can go. I totally believe this could be an important new feature for Poser users.

Well Ockham, I'm glad this caught your eye! It seems to me that if you have a number of 3D objects in a scene it would be very handy to run a single Python script to set this all up, especially like in the case of not conforming hair, etc. many people conform by habit and in a mixed 3D scene lots of things could go wrong. Not everyone is as bright as you and SnowSultan. I think more people could screw this up than you realize. But especially, it would be a real time saver to load a script that would properly set up all the figures, scenery, etc, plus set up a single main light- but provide options on light color and maybe even 1 or 2 more lights. It would also be a great time-saver to have MAT-MOR files that would set up textures maps without highlights, etc. But I would guess a Py script could do this even faster, I would assume.

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SnowSultan, If I were DAZ, I would offer you an immediate job! (But I'm not DAZ) Just think your ideas are very bright! And I still think the Z-Toon idea has lots more potential. If people want to offer Freebies, that would be the best thing of all. I have posted a link to a Renderosity product called "MAEVE". I happened to have purchased it months ago when it was on sale, but never even used it. But last night I unzipped it and have been using it with amazingly good results with your Z-Toon concept. "Maeve" is a V2 character and I think was just waiting in a zip file for the day when your tutorial would set her free. I looked up the creators bio and it turns out he is also a big Manga and Toon fan. I personally have found relatively little touching up to do, except that I do more post-work anyway as I can't help myself once I'm in Photoshop!

I forgot to mention too, and probably few people know, or have tried it, is that Poser EXPORTS a Painter script file, which Painter can import and does it "auto-painting" routine. However, it never looks the same as how it looked in Poser. It really depended on exactly which brush setting you used in Painter as to how it would be rendered. It's another thing I've played around with and thought that it had lots of interesting potential. Someday maybe the curious and brilliant mind of SnowSultan might figure this all out and give us another great tutorial. I think the whole concept is another great idea that someone will eventually follow up on.