Skip to main content

Make Disney/Pixar Style Characters with Reallusion's Character Creator and Toon Figure Bases

The Extraordinary Tourist Classic Coat outfit
created using Reallusion's Toon Designer for CC3.
I've talked before how I've wanted to get into 3D Disney/Pixar style character animation since I first saw the animated cutscenes for the very first Tomb Raider game back in 1996.

It's why I initially bought Reallusion's iClone 3D studio app as soon as I could afford a computer that would run it.

But then Reallusion released their 3D Character Creator (CC) for iClone and I wanted to create my characters with that (and I did try with Bat Storm). But the focus of CC was realism, even with ToKoMotion's stylised body morphs.

Now with Reallusion's Cartoon Designer bundle for CC3 which features two packs, Toon Figures, and Toon Hair, designing Disney/Pixar style 3D characters just got a whole lot quicker.



The two packs are the bare essentials for creating Toon style characters. Five body morphs (2 male, 2 female, and one adolescent body morph that works as both a male or female pre teen), eleven hair style bases, with thirteen hair additions for further variation.

There are five head shapes with several variations for eyes, nose, and lip treatments and two different PBR skin textures too (one plain and one with some detail such as makeup).

Detailed breakdown of the various
character head/face options.

Those of you with a sharp eye for detail may notice a severe lack of cultural diversity in this line up. Which doesn't mean you're stuck with white characters only, it'll just take a bit more effort to change skin tones and other features to what you need.

My attempt at a non-white toon character. This hair
is not included in the Toon hair pack.

That's the beauty of Reallusion's Character Creator. Even though you may start with these body morphs you're not limited to what they have to offer. Mix it up with other body morphs and settings inside CC itself.

There's no actual character outfits included in the pack (like I said it's a bare bones starter pack for toon characters) but you can dress your characters in whatever outfits you have in your CC content library. Unfortunately that does mean you may have to work at toning down the realistic textures and styles. Hopefully Reallusion will release some additional Toon packs in the future with outfits and accessories designed in similar style.

A sample of hairstyles from
the Toon Hairs pack.
I also hope they'll release additional hairs for toon characters too. Whilst this first pack is a really good start it leans heavily toward more feminine styles once you include all the hair additions. As well, the male hairs are all quite modern styles. It would be nice to see a few more classic, timeless styles for men. Not all men fill their hair with 'product' (just sayin').

Overall, Reallusion's Cartoon Character Designer Bundle for Character Creator 3 is a welcome addition to my own CC3/iClone7 library. It makes it very quick to whip up a variety of toon style characters in a short time and they blend well with other body morphs and settings in CC3 for even more variety of design.

I certainly hope they'll prove popular for Reallusion because it would be great to see the range extended with more body morphs, outfits, and even scenes and props in the toon style.

Comments

  1. What hair did you use for the black character you created. I did figure out that just turning the brightness to -50 gets you a nice brown tone. Curious of the settings you used and any other recommendation.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The hair comes from the stylized 'Slacker' character that comes with CC3 as part of the learning resources. It's just called 'Slacker_Hair'. If you have it it'll be in the top menu of the Hair folder.

      Delete
  2. Replies
    1. All I did was select the Materials tab, select the skin material you want to change from the list, right click on the base color, and select 'Adjust Color' from the menu that comes up. From there adjust the brightness and contrast sliders to whatever shade you need.

      Delete
  3. Wow. Amazing! Who doesn't love the Pixar look, right? It's so dreamy. Probably the best animation to feed your eyes.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I just like it because it's kind of midway between 2D drawings and film. You still get that cartoon style but you can picture the characters walking around in the real world too - sort like your action figures coming to life.

      Delete

Post a Comment

This blog is monitored by a real human. Generic or unrelated spam comments with links to sites of dubious relativity may be DELETED.

I welcome, read, and respond to genuine comments relating to each post. If your comment isn't that save me some time by not posting it.

Popular posts from this blog

Eight 2D Animation Apps For Your Phone or Tablet Mobile Device

M obile productivity apps have become so capable that they can be great alternatives to their PC/MAC equivalents or serve as great tools in their own right when you're away from your desk. While some apps simply mimic their desktop counterparts, others offer well thought out, touch-friendly interfaces that are easier and more fun to use. Every so often I check out what's available for 2D animation for Android devices, since that's what I use, that can complement my workflow with Reallusion's Cartoon Animator 5. Some may be available for Apple devices as well. Below I've listed six free (F) apps (with optional paid (P) upgrades) on the Google Play Store that you might want to explore. Some are just fun apps on their own while others may be useful as part of your workflow on bigger animation projects. Not all are exclusively animation apps and could be used on any production. JotterPad (F/P) The name JotterPad makes this sound like a notepad application but it's ...

Learning Moho Pro 12 (Anime Studio Pro) - Part 2, Debut Videos 1-15

Alvin Owl: Bones Rig. In part 2 of my journal blog documenting my progress with learning Moho Pro 12 I dive head first into the first batch of video tutorials covering the basics of Anime Studio Debut.... wait, what? In Part 1 I described how the video tutorials I purchased with Moho Pro 12 were in no particular order and made for a confusing mess. As well, most of the video tutorials are really for Anime Studio 11, which has all the same basic features minus whatever new features have been added.

Skate Monkey (Part 1) - My first Crazy Talk Animator Multi-Dimensional Character

Continuing on with my progress of  learning Crazy Talk Animator 2 I've begun work on creating my first Multi-Dimensional character. As you may have guessed it's my Skate Monkey character that I briefly attempted to turn into a CTA1 character quite some time back (See this post for the video ). A CTA2 'Multi-Dimensional' character is simply a character that consists of 10 different view angles that form a 360 degree view. This character is attached to a bone skeleton that exists in three dimensional space. The software then calculates which images from your 10 different view angles are needed to execute whatever motion you add. In the image below you can see my skate monkey character drawn at angle zero in the Serif DrawPlus template provided by Reallusion. The other nine view angles are the CTA2 dummy character which I will progressively replace with my monkey as I draw more views. A CTA2 Multi-Dimensional character has 10 view angles. In the short video be...

Inochi2D - Free Open Source 2D VTuber Avatar Rigging and Puppeteering Software (Part 1)

Inochi2D Creator - Free Open Source VTuber Software. If you've been looking for a way to live perform as a 2D cartoon avatar on camera, whether it be for a live stream or for pre-recorded content like educational videos, then VTuber software is a low cost (or even no cost) option worth looking into. In my previous post, How to Become a VTuber - 2D and 3D Software for Creating and Controlling Your Avatar , I took a brief look at the relatively new but completely free and open source Inochi2D  which I thought showed great potential for my own needs of creating a live performance character rig for my own TET Avatar that I use for all my promotional materials. While it is possible to live perform my character using Cartoon Animator itself, Reallusion's MotionLive2D capture system isn't great - with lip sync in particular. More importantly though, I can't exactly teach people how to use Cartoon Animator if I'm using Cartoon Animator to control my Avatar. What is Inochi2D...

How to Get Popular on GoAnimate

At the time of writing this post I am the third most viewed GoAnimate Member of all time and the most fanned , non staff member of all time (second only to GoAnimate CEO, Alvin Hung ). I get asked a lot - how I did I get so popular on GoAnimate? Whilst others, like GoAnimate member, gipsy , have created excellent web sites like Gispy Tips devoted to how to make the most of GoAnimate - including getting popular - I thought I'd share my secrets. Below is everything I've ever done to get me to where I am today on the site, listed as tips for how to get popular. I'll preface it with 'slow and steady wins the race' . I wasn't always at the top. It's taken me two years of releasing, on average, two animations per month. I've passed members on the site who are easily at the same technical level as me (and probably better in their own ways too). How did I do it? Read the tips below - it ain't rocket science! Tell a good or funny story. Tell it r...

Pencil - Free 2D Animation Software

Pencil is a 2D bitmap and vector based, free animation tool for MACs, Windows and Linux that I'd like to say is the perfect introduction to 2D, computer assisted animation but can't. It is a great tool. Clearly set out, easy enough to learn, versatile. In fact you can create an entire animation within Pencil, including audio tracks, and then export it all to a single movie file that you can upload anywhere. It will also export files as Flash/Shockwave movies (which is my interest in using it). However, the Windows version of Pencil is extremely buggy making it frustrating to use and sometimes down right impossible (forced software closures, lost work etc.). I suspect as a tool for creating animations, using bitmap images, Pencil is ideal. There's much less to go wrong. On top of that you could choose to edit all your frames in any bitmap editing software you choose then just import them into Pencil, add some sounds, export to a movie file and you're done. If that's...

The Ultimate Independent Animator's App and Resource List - Animation and Video Life

Image created with Cartoon Animator 4. Being an independent animator is not like a studio animation job. There's so much more to do that is indirectly related to the actual task of animating. Over the years I've sought out many apps, tools, and services that can help me achieve that one single task, expressing myself through animation. Below is my Ultimate Independent Animator's Resource List for 2024 (last updated Oct 2024). It started out as a list of free or low cost apps that could help you in every stage of producing either 2D or 3D animation, and then just kind of grew from there. You may not have been looking for a Time Management App as much as you needed something to get you started in 3D animation but when those commissioned projects start coming in you'll have a head start on maximizing your time. All the apps and services on this list had to meet two main criteria: They had to be useful and relevant to an Indy Animator/artist. The base app/se...