Hi Chris, Sorry that I haven't gotten back on the piston thing. Haven't had the time to play with that yet. I do more stills then IK animation so I'll have to spend a little time. I'm sure that you'll find no two paths are the same to professional 3D and illustration. I started 15 years ago as an airbrush artist. Because of a couple of specific clients I force fed myself techincal illustration skills. About that time computers were becoming viable illustration tools so I migrated to them. 3D tools are a natural for techincial work so I jumped in with RayDream 3. Most early business came from referrals and relentless networking. Then when the bucks started slowly coming in I started advertising in national illustration directories like American Showcase, Workbook and Black Book. I found that I could sell more illustration if I also controlled the design of the jobs that they went into. Consequently, I started doing more and more design work to feed my illustration habit :) The networking/referral aspect is still a large part of marketing though. Basically, I think that if you want to succeed in a illustrator/animator field, you have to have some kind of dysfunctional need to produce imagery. That way you'll put up with all the garbage it takes to produce 3 seconds of glory. Good luck, Mark