im inclined to say that this topic has gone way off topic :) as far as render engines and fav apps, come on ppl, its as agiel said, different tools in different price segments, they all have different strenghts and hurdles to overcome, different lack of features and different usages, which is why most studios dont use just one app. so use whatever fits your own need, c4 looks damn nice as a general 3d app in its price category, but standing up for it like a madrabit doesnt make it better gweb, open your eyes, i wont be surprised myself if i pick up c4 pro since i realy like what ive seen but it cant be compared to xsi or vue5 because they all make their own thing. xsi foundations is a great pick for serious modeling and rendering, complex, timeconsuming but a great pick if youre looking to get hired full time later on, no doubt about it, and its affordable, and yes the renderer is realy good. vue5, hands down i believe its the best landscape/render app for its price segment out there, it has shortcomings like the lack of video import,weather fx and so on. to sum it up, my personal opinion is that you would do pretty well picking up all 3 apps, c4pro, vue5pro(hoping for weather fx) and xsi foundation. of course any combination of just two of these 3 apps would do realy well aswell, but you would still be missing a couple of options.