Still no luck whatsoever! I rescaled all the textures, and checked the transparencies, removed the bumps and applied Mark's "bump to shininess/highlight" trick, but my render is still too slow... I improved a bit, but that's just it, "a bit"... grrrrr.... After fiddling this much I discovered a nice effect, from appliying the bump map to the reflection channel and setting it very low (5%) you get some great looking shininess on the skin! I've been trying to get this natural "oily skin" effect for a looong time, and seems like I'm on the way. At least i learned something new. :D I'll keep working on this scene, thank a lot for your help, keep it up!! Ike.