Ok then I USE truespace 3.2 and wings, and have occasionally modelled in Bryce ( don't worry, I got over it). I have on my system, Cinema3d, Blender and Amapi - none of which I can use. I bought the manual for Blender - and it made even less sense than before. I bought Brycetech's CD on Amapi - but either my copy of the program or my computer just don't do what everyone says it should, so I gave up. I use the spline tools in Cinema3d if I want to play with curves, but that's about it. Sharing 'cos I suspect I'm typical of many lurkers - I'm interested - have tried many things, but the frustration of constant repeated, unexplainable failures just wears you down after a while. Now I know ther'e lots of kind folk over on the forums for these apps that will try and help, but the problem is they can't unless they're actually sitting next to you. I guess what I'm trying to say is that it's very difficult to say what we need, because if we knew that we'd be half way to solving the problems ourselves? A bit like the teacher who asks 'what didn't you understand about differential equations then?' To which the only sane answer is of course: 'er - differential equations!' So how to breathe life into the forum then? Well I think tutorials are great - as far as they go, but how about a tutorial with feedback - and I don't just mean back-patting - I mean crits. Is anyone up for that? Someone posts a tut, there's a general invitation to have a go - with the option to personalize it a bit, then we post the results and graciously allow each other to help us by pointing out things that we can't see, or don't know - without getting all precious and defensive. If folk are up for this, then we can really turn this forum into something. Whaddya say?