The Flat look

Flat is the third render style : solid color shapes, thick outlines, a paper-cream page. It looks like a flat illustration, but it is lit like a cel cartoon. Flat is drawn, not unlit.

Cel light

• The sun shades every shape in flat steps: a lit side and a shade side with a clean edge between them, like paint layers. Drag the sun and the edge walks around the shapes.
• Shadows are always on; there is no switch. They draw as flat shapes on the ground, and they swing with the sun like every real shadow .
• Lamps light in bands: a painted lamp lays flat rings of light around itself, brightest in the middle, stepping down outward. Night scenes work in Flat, in the style’s own language.

The Shading switch

Flat’s section in Atmosphere > Style has a Shading switch: Soft | Classic | Bold sets how hard the cel steps read, from a light touch to full ink.

What stays flat

Reflections and glows stay out of Flat on purpose: no shine, no haze. Light paint reads as bright color plus its cel bands, Water and Shiny faces read as their colors. The style’s whole promise is that everything looks drawn with the same pen.

Flat is a lens like the other styles: switch in, switch out, nothing about the model changes. Cozy scenes and picture-book characters suit it best.