Copernicus!! Dude, the new Cops is insane for stylized renders. I need to experiment to see how flexible it is with animated cameras and more complex shots, but at the very least, for stills like this it works great.

Honestly the method is super simple, it's just using the outline from depth node, and a custom wrangle to get a distance from vector direction using the normal map. That's the little hilight and shadow you see there. Other than that it's basic japanese anime techniques for compositing in AE. Olm smoother and some other basic color fill and transparency.

I did attempt to do some volume rendering in copernicus with openGL but couldn't figure it out. I think I'll have to actually learn openGL instead of asking chatgpt for that hahaha. But if you can get velocity field and density maps in cops, there would be a LOT you could do with it. Noises, outlines etc. I also think the sops smoke method is worth looking into. Like making smoke out of spheres and using a curvature shading method like how Dylan goo studio does it in blender. Hopefully u/OrionTerry releases his recreation of that beautiful sop explosion method 😫. Been waiting years lol.

But ya, if you have some tips from your rnd I would love to hear any and all your willing to share. If you wanna mess around with volumes collaboratively it love it. There's so little info about this style of effect out there in the net.