Adding toon lines and shading to a scene
 
 
 

You can use toon lines on all three types of geometry—NURBS, polygons and subdivision surfaces—as well as on strokes, Paint Effects brushes and Paint Effects hair. The lines are generated directly from a combination of the input geometry and the current view. You can control the appearance of these lines with the attributes in the pfxToon node; for descriptions of these attributes, see pfxToonShape node. You can also paint additional lines using Paint Effects.

To add toon shading to a scene

  1. Create the 3D geometry you want to render in 2D.
  2. Assign Toon shaders to the geometry ( Toon > Assign Fill Shader).
  3. Assign Toon outlines to the geometry ( Toon > Assign Outline).
  4. Optionally, set a background color for the rendered scene ( Toon > Set Camera Background Color).
  5. Render the scene.

    Notes on rendering:

    • You can render all toon lines using the Maya Software renderer.
    • If you used the Paint Effects method for profile lines, then before you render in the Maya Software renderer, turn on the Oversample and Oversample Post Filter checkboxes in the Paint Effects Rendering Options section of the Maya Software tab in the Render Settings window.
    • To render Paint Effects toon lines using the mental ray® for Maya or the Maya Hardware renderers, you must first convert the toon lines to polygons. See To convert toon lines to polygons. Alternatively, use the Offset Mesh method for profile lines, which will render for these renderers. (You can set this method in the Profile Lines section of the pfxToonShape node.)