What software would you recommend for making 3D cartoon characters to later render in 2D?

Would you like to re-phrase that?

im looking for 3D software i can make cartoon people in.

Are you saying that you want to draw a character in two dimensions and then use software to render to 3D?

the other way round, i would like to draw my character in 3D and then render it to 2D so that i dont need to keep drawing it manually from different perspectives or making loads of sprites.

ill come back edit in a minute with an example…

Autodesk is really good, kind of pricey but very good 3D rendering software

Autodesk requires the image to be developed geometrically, not free-hand. That is what I was thinking, but to convert (not render) from a 3D drawing to a 2d image is a new one for me.

Don’t you just love the April Fool’s messed IDs?

something i can create a 3D version of this guy with, that i model in 3D and render to 2D.

They could have interspersed some cute and sexy girls. Even – as we are talking cartoons – things like Jessica Rabbit.

Have you looked at this site? http://cartooncreation.com/

@darkscribe i had not seen that one, ill check it out thx.

Adobe CS4 Suite has 3D rendering capability, but 2D to 3D not the other way around.

http://freeartsoftware.com/
Bryce is listed and was often bundled with PhotoShop. Seems to be part of DAZ which is freeware/open source I think. check link
http://freeartsoftware.com/

Check out Blender

http://www.blender.org/

I don’t really have any expertise on this area, but I do happen to know the South Park studios use Maya for the exact same reasons as you describe (alas, how I do not know if it requires any special plugins).

Cinema 4d. Powerful and easy to use.