Digital Art Zone

Hi
While browsing the store today this caught my attention (http://www.daz3d.com/shop/vectorstyle-2-for-carrara)
however it only has one product image which just shows mechanical objects that have been output using the plugin
I’d be really grateful if someone could provide a few some samples of how human characters look using it and if possible an AI file so that I can see how clean lines are when brought into illustrator.
Any help would be appreciated
Thanks

People generally won’t look very good with the VectorStyle exporter, in my opinion… Certainly you lose most detail and shading… But I typically do not find *any* vector drawings of people to be very attractive.

A stylized or “toon” figure might give good resullts, but it depends on what you’d find acceptable detail…

I’m attempting to export a figure in a few formats… in the meantime these images are from the Docs:

You can download 2 vector exports here:
http://www.3d.wetcircuit.com/xtra/Alex.eps
http://www.3d.wetcircuit.com/xtra/Alex.svg

This was just a scene/figure I had handy. I have not changed textures or lights to try to improve the results.

Here is the EPS. I set the export background to white, but it did not take, apparently…

...and the SVG

all vectors are selectable and editable in Illustrator.

For comparison this is the figure rendered with Carrara.

Boosted Ambient Light to 50%. Turned off shadows and highlight in the exporter, with quality setting at “Best” and fill set to “Gradients”. I have transparency turned on but clearly there are issues with the eyes and lashes.

Thanks a lot for taking the time to post all those images holly wetcircuit
It looks like it could be just what I’m after
Can anyone tell me if the plugin works in Carrara 8.5 or does it only work with Carrara 8?

a few times a year it comes down to about 29 dollars I think

Son of Belmont - 19 October 2012 06:23 PM

Thanks a lot for taking the time to post all those images holly wetcircuit
It looks like it could be just what I’m after
Can anyone tell me if the plugin works in Carrara 8.5 or does it only work with Carrara 8?

When you buy it, it’s called VECTORSTYLE2 FOR CARRARA6…

Then you will get a hundred versions with obtuse names like:
VECTORSYLE2 FOR CARRARA 6 for Carrara 7
VECTORSYLE2 FOR CARRARA 6 for Carrara 8 64bit

I had to dig around for the serial number, apparently the original for C6 has a different serial than for C7+

Hi Son of Belmont,

Although I have not worked specifically with figures and Vectorsyle, I can tell you that the complexity and polygon count of the objects can be an issue with getting a good vector file.

It works very well for simple, low poly objects although there is a documented bug with some color shifting in the output.

Another appoach is described here using Toon Pro and YA Toon, http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewthread/9456/

To get vector work in illustrator, its possible to take the “toon” style bitmap rendering and convert them in illustrator. The “live” trace in illustrator may not produce the best results for this, but a plugin for illustrator appears to do a very good job based on word of mouth, although I have not used it myself, http://www.astutegraphics.com/products/

The live trace in illustrator is not “bad” but it can make a very large file with lots of small tracings, especially if you have it set to 256 colors. I believe the advantage of the Astutegraphics “Phantasm” plugin is that it can create vector halftone patterns. What is unclear is if it can produce a vector halftone pattern from a bitmap.

Chris

I purchased it and have been playing with it in the 8.5 beta of Carrara
SWF files save perfectly but for some reason when I try making an EPS or SVG file it comes out coloured completely black in Illustrator despite the preview having shown otherwise.

Son of Belmont - 20 October 2012 08:26 PM

I purchased it and have been playing with it in the 8.5 beta of Carrara
SWF files save perfectly but for some reason when I try making an EPS or SVG file it comes out coloured completely black in Illustrator despite the preview having shown otherwise.

Check your scene for a blocking transparent object. I could not get EPS or SVG to respect transparency. Did not test the illustrator or flash formats…

HI all

I just got this too, so I’m playing catch-up to holly as usual….

On the AI export…

From the docs

You’ll notice that when you choose AI as an export option, the Area Gradient Fill mode become unavailable. This is due to the fact that Level 3 EPS is not currently supported by VectorStyle 2

it would probably be easier to use SVG instead of AI

On transparency,
that works for me,.. as long as I set the slider in the fill options tab, and your shader has some transparency value.

One issue I do have is EPS,. ..
Xara gives me an error when I try to open or import any of the exported eps files, and that’s a first for xara which normally handles anything

Flash works fine and that’s probably where it’ll be most used.

the first image is a flash frame, with the transparency showing on the cube.

the second is SVG with some issues on the “non transparent” sphere, but the cube and transparency seem ok

For what it’s worth, I accidentally discovered the EDIT menu has a VectorStyle Preview window (down nearly at the bottom of the list where the plugins show).

That should save some time, and you don’t have to “save” the file from the Export menu before you see what you are doing….

3DAGE - 22 October 2012 10:52 AM

HI all

I just got this too, so I’m playing catch-up to holly as usual….

lol
<3

out of interest toon pro does nice clean lines around objects (except eyelashes which you need to pull into the head to get rid of - or post work them out)
you can take them into inkscape as a BMP and do a path trace to vectorize them
haven’t found how to save them out yet, (except as a Tiff) but it should be possible.

Hi head wax:)

If you are saying what I think, you can save from Inkscape as eps and convert to ai using uniconverter http://sk1project.org/modules.php?name=Products&product=uniconvertor&op=download