You mentioned that your an Artist/Illistrator. With that I assume that you probably have a 2D image program like Painter, Paint Shop Pro, or Photoshop. with Poser there is a LOT of free stuff out there to get your feet wet without spending additional money, however most of the free stuff has commercial limitations, you can ask and some people will let you sell an image using their free item, but you have to ask. There are TONS of extra clothing, enviorments, subscription sites, etc to add to your poser use, like the above mentioned Daz Millinium models. If you have a image program, and can already draw, with poser you can pose the model, then render and take that and draw the scenery in your image program, add clothing by painting or drawing etc. You do not always have to model in 3d the clothing item, get it in poser tweak it and render and then take it in image editor. Many different ways of doing things. for animation Poser 5 still has some problems, CuriousLabs has state they are working on the next software update and that may fix more, then Poser 6 when it's release is supposedly going to fix all the things wrong with Poser 5. I don't do animation but people that do have expereinced a bunch of problems with poser 5 and animation, Poser 4 is more stable in some areas supposedly. you certainly could not go wrong buying PoserArtist (formerly Poser4) I've seen it for $89, CuriousLabs charges $119. lot of the functionality is already there for ya, you could then jump up to ProPack for animation tools as needed. Poser has primative shapes that can be used to create new items, props, scenes etc. Dr. Geep posts here regularly tutorials on creting things IN poser using just the basics, always amazing. There are enough people around that if you NEED something, gererally it's been thought of and can be found, or someone will come along and you can buy it. If you need the latest Chanel Jacket from this season on your figure in poser chances are that you will need a 3d program because you cannot really do that IN poser, there are a lot of free 3d programs that you CAN create items for poser and not hurt your wallet, just depends on your level, learning curve and wallet. If your an artist and illustrator Poser will fit in your set of tools. wow, long winded or WHAT! gewd! I'm done now. haha!