Cell shading issue...

[elturcoloco2010]

I've created a Shaded Brightness three Tone and applied to a surface in a scene with 4 different directional lights but when I make a Render it the shadows looks terrible. I need to know what can I do to fix this. I've attached an image with a render showing the problem.

[n8skow]

The sphere looks kinda blocky - have you tried increasing the tesselation?

Also try softening your normals.

[elturcoloco2010]

Sorry for the delay, I've tried to increase the tesselation but doesn't work.
About the softening, how do you soften the normals of a NURB Sphere?

Thanks for your answer

[n8skow]

Can you upload your scene file?

[elturcoloco2010]

sure, here you go...

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxmEkjoXt3wuazNIOGZQUFNjLTA/edit?usp=sharing

[n8skow]

Is this a Maya 2015 scene?

Can you save out a .ma file - (Maya 2014 here...)

[elturcoloco2010]

it's a Maya 2014 scene.

And won't let me save it as .ma, when i try to save displays this messaje: "file contains unknown nodes or data. To preserve this information, the current file type cannot be changed."

[n8skow]

Hmmm, I'm getting an error message when I open the file in 2014 here:

requires "cartoonShader60" "6.0";
# Error: line 1: RuntimeError: file <maya console> line 1: Plug-in, "cartoonShader60", was not found on MAYA_PLUG_IN_PATH. #
// Warning: line 0: Unrecognized node type for node 'cartoonRenderGlobals1'; preserving node information during this session. //
// Warning: line 0: Unrecognized node type for node 'tierra_cartoonRenderGlobals1'; preserving node information during this session. //
// Warning: line 0: Unrecognized node type for node 'techos_cartoonRenderGlobals1'; preserving node information during this session. //
// File read in 1 seconds.
// Warning: line 0: Errors have occurred while reading this scene that may result in data loss.

Is cartoonShader a 3rd party plug-in you installed?

Also - when I look in the hypershade, I'm not seeing a toon material - how did you go about creating the material you are using?

[elturcoloco2010]

That's weird, I've used the Shaded Brightness three tone in the Toon menu.
I've cleaned some settings in the file, try to download it again please.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxmEkjoXt3wuYVRlNlgzdlM4LTg/edit?usp=sharing

[n8skow · Accepted solution]

Still no luck... when I open your file and look at the hypershade - there is no toon shader.

I've just created a new shaded brightness 3 tone material and assigned it to the sphere...

One thing I"m noticing though is you have a directional light with depth map shadows turned on - that may actually be what's causing that rough terminator in your render. You sould be able to tweak the resolution and filter size to lessen the issue you are seeing -or- possibly used ray traced shadows instead.

[elturcoloco2010]

Thanks!!! that worked perfectly!

[n8skow]

Glad to hear.