blender still has a few kinks to work out but it is really very powerful. it is basically the open source alternative to Maya and has some very advanced animation tools. at the blender site there are a series of short films made in blender that will give you an idea Gimp is the open source alternative to photoshop. it has many of the same functions. It even has animated brushes so one can get some truer drawing effects. the website for gimp is www.gimp.org