Poser 11 includes powerful features for comic style renders.

Poser's already impressive comic book mode has several additional options that give you a new level of control over the outside “ink” lines of your image.

Things change depending on which toon option you choose. Each has strengths and weaknesses, but you can use the one that best represents the mood or look you are going for. You can do this with any figure, any character and any lights. You can even do a hybrid effect using multiple methods that include the toon outline but with additional textures and material groups.

The possibilities are endless and only things you have to remember are toons only render in Firefly in Poser 11 and you have to use the preview renderer.

If you need more, try the tutorial below.

Cartoon Display Style

Comic book preview mode displays the items in your preview window with a look that is similar to comic book illustration, without the need to assign materials that have Toon IDs. The previews include persistent shadowing and improved outlining. Comic Book styles not only work in Texture Shaded mode, but they also work with any other display style (Wireframe, Flat shaded, Cartoon, and so on).

You get there by going to Cartoon Settings (Display > Cartoon Settings), which allows you to simulate a render in a hand-drawn style, complete with thick lines and shaders.

The most straight-forward way to create this style of art is to use Poser's "Cartoon with Line" option. It's the same as the Cartoon display style, except that figures/elements are outlined with black lines.

You can fine-tune your toon using the Comic Book Filter options – like choosing between black and white or color, but remember it affects clothing first.

Using Cartoon Tones allows you to choose between the following options for your scene preview display: One, Two, or Three cartoon shading tones, Three Tones Plus Highlights, and Smooth Toned.

Geometric Edge Lines

If you want to keep a 3D look with your cartoon, you can use Geometric Edge Lines under Cartoon Settings. This gives you control over the edge lines that surround the cartoon figure.

It's in real time and controlled by a slider that sets the thickness of the line. This option gives your comic book preview a thicker outline around the edges of the figure.

To implement geometric edge lines, Poser draws the selected shape in black color, resizes it, and then removes the front shape to generate the edge line. Geometric edge lines cannot work with shapes that have transparencies applied to them, because anything that is transparent will show the black color behind it. Where a material has transparency set to On (such as trans-mapped hair or eyelashes), geometric edge lines are disabled.

If you have any artifacts, the weld option can remove them.

Toon Outline

The Toon Outline option uses post-processing during the rendering process to draw an outline around the edges of cartoon images. You can select from nine outline brush styles. We recommend applying a Toon shader node to your images, and then complementing that shading with the Toon Outline option. Check the Toon Outline checkbox to enable this feature.

Set up your Wacro

No matter which option you choose to create your toon art, setting up the Toon Render Wacro will give you a premium quality style toon. The Set Up Toon Render Wacro will configure your material to appear cartoon-like when rendered. Clicking the button opens a dialog asking whether you want to have specular highlights on your toon surfaces.

To set up the Wacro, click either No or Yes on the dialog box and Poser will then attach the following nodes: a Toon diffuse node; material’s Image_ Map node, and a Glossy specular node. Use these to fine-tune your toon.

What can you create? Let us know on Twitter at @poserpro, using #CreateWithPoser.