Cartoon Shading

Introduction

In this chapter we'll cover the cartoon shading (VolumeVRayToon) implemented in V-Ray. VolumeVRayToon is a very simple atmospheric plugin that produces cartoon-style outlines on objects in the scene. Note that VolumeVRayToon is not intended to be a full NPR (non-photorealistic rendering) effect. However, it may be useful in many cases.

Why an Atmospheric effect?

There are several solutions for adding toon effects to 3d renderings for 3ds Max; most of them function either as special materials (shaders) or as render (post) effects. Each of these approaches has both advantages and limitations. VolumeVRayToon has been implemented as an atmospheric effect for several reasons:

• The implementation is very simple.
• Works with any geometry supported by V-Ray, including displaced objects, Procedural Fur and Proxy Objects, etc.
• Works with any camera type supported by V-Ray (spherical, fish-eye etc).
• Works with any camera effects (depth of field and/or motion blur).
• Works with raytraced effects such as reflection and refraction.
• Smooth and consistent outlines for intersecting objects.

Parameters

The parameters of the effect are controlled by the VolumeVRayToon plugin. It renders cartoon style contours on all meshes (by default) or using an include/exclude list. It has the following parameters:

• The implementation is very simple.
• Works with any geometry supported by V-Ray, including displaced objects, Procedural Fur and Proxy Objects, etc.
• Works with any camera type supported by V-Ray (spherical, fish-eye etc).
• Works with any camera effects (depth of field and/or motion blur).
• Works with raytraced effects such as reflection and refraction.
• Smooth and consistent outlines for intersecting objects.

Example

You can see the commented parameters in the scene bundle.

Notes

• VolumeVRayToon only provides outlines. You will need to come up with your own cartoon-style materials (for example, using falloff maps etc or other third-party material plugins).
• VolumeVRayToon has no per-object settings; however, you can add several VolumeVRayToon atmospherics to the scene, each applied to a different set of objects through the Include/exclude objects list.
• VolumeVRayToon will not work properly with objects that have their Cast Shadows property turned off.
• The quality of the lines depends on the current settings of the Image sampler.