MK Manga – Ink & Stylized Shader

🎨 The Idea🎨

Bring Manga Aesthetics to Life in 3D

MK Manga is an ink-based, stylized shader that transforms 3D models into authentic manga-style artwork. It supports both grayscale and full-color shading, making it ideal for manga, comics, and toon-style visuals.

🔥To tackle that idea the package consists of the following main shaders🔥

6 Core shaders for unlit, simple lighting and physically based lighting. Those shaders are very flexible and can turn any input into a manga style shading. Per-object outline variants are also available.

• UI Shaders. Create speech bubbles using outlines and stencil.
• Extra shaders for hair and skin to come even closer to a manga-like style.
• Gradient skybox shader. Lets you create simple greyscale gradient skyboxes.

Demo: WebGL

⤴️MK Manga Shader synergizes very well with MK Edge Detection.⤴️(this combination was used for the school example scene)

If you miss any essential feature or asset resource, feel free to drop me a message at any time to improve the shader!

🌄Gooch Lighting & Color Control🌄

Interpolate shadows and highlights into specific colors, and adjust contrast, saturation, and brightness with pre- and post-composite modes. You can even choose from three styles of how the grayscale conversion is created. However this shader is not limited to grayscale color only.

🌌Physically-Based & Customizable🌌

Supports albedo, emission, normal, height, and occlusion maps with detail enhancements. You can follow a common physically based workflow and all properties are converted into a manga style.

🌑Dynamic Cel Shading🌑

Define the base lighting style of your scene with crisp cel shading. Easily tweak smoothness, thresholds, and layers to capture a wide range of manga-inspired lighting effects.

An optional second cel layer can further refine your lighting.

🌓Stylized Shadows🌓

Achieve sharp, bold shadows or smooth gradients, fully customizable to match manga’s iconic high-contrast style. Shadows are stylized with fine control over smoothness and thresholds.

✍️Gradient Overlay✍️

Add subtle gradients to your objects with two customizable colors and a 3D direction, enhancing the albedo and overall look of your scene.

📐Texture Projections📐

For many features you can choose from multiple projection modes to apply patterns seamlessly:

- Regular UV.

- Screen Space.

- Stabilized Screen Space (minimizes scrolling effects).

- Triplanar (Object or World Space).

🖌️Per-object Outlines🖌️

Outlines are customizable per object and fading with distance for a polished look. Additional parameters will help you to create a good-looking per-object outline even on objects with difficult geometry.

🖋️Pen Styles for Shading🖋️

Replicate classic manga shading with three unique pen styles:

- Cross Hatching: Add depth with six-step hatch patterns.

- Pattern Overlay: Overlay dots or textures on lit or shadowed areas.

- Sketch: Use custom textures for pencil-like scribbles or sketches.

🌟Silhouette Shading🌟

Create rim lighting effects with two modes:

- Single Color for consistent highlights.

- Split Lit/Shadow Colors for more dynamic effects.

🖼️Projective Overlays🖼️

Overlay scalable patterns onto your meshes, such as grids or textures. Includes all projection modes for seamless integration.

🖊️Ink & Strokes🖊️

Overlay textures or procedurally generate strokes to simulate inner lines and brushwork, adding depth and authenticity to your models.

Texture Mode: Overlay user-provided textures for inner lines or blotches.

Brush Mode: Detect edges procedurally based on an input texture (for example your albedo map) and generate strokes automatically.

🪞Stutter/Redrawn Effects🪞

Simulate a hand-drawn or animated feel with subtle stuttering or redrawing patterns for dynamic, lively shading.

💾Updates + Maintenance + Support💾

All of my assets receive updates, are maintained regularly and supported as best as possible.

🌈Do you have some cool stuff to show?

I would love to see your results (high resolution screenshots / videos) using the shader. Just drop me a message.

💡Questions, bug reports, feature requests, feedback or just to say hello💡

Feel free to get in touch via [email protected] at any time.