I finally got Poser 4. I've d/l several charaters from the free poser stuff here, but I don't understand how they work. Some, such as Yoko, have a .pz3 file in them, so I get a figure plus textures, bmp's, etc. Others, however, such as Silver, contain file formats such as .cr2 (I don't know what that is), and I'll be damned if I can figure out how to load these new characters into the workspace. Are the latter new models, or are they treated as textures to be put on existing models like the P4 female? I've spent all morning trying to figure this out, and the manual isn't of much use in this case. I'd really appreciate the help.

Well, Ill try to explain it, but my english isnt very good. Pz3 files are poser documents. When you save a work in Poser, it is saved as a .pz3 file. All you have to do to open this file is double click on it. Cr2 files are "character" files. They go inside Poser/Runtime/Libraries/Characters/any folder you want. Just place it there and next time you open the Character menu in Poser, at the right of the screen, youll find it there. Other suffixes youll find are (all, inside Poser/Runtime/Libraries/...): Camera: .cm2 Faces: .fc2 Hair: .hr2 Hand: .hd2 Light: .lt2 Pose: .pz2 Props: .pp2 Obj. files go into Poser/Runtime/Geometries. You should read all the read me files that come with the downloads to know exactly where to place the files. Well, hope this helps at least a bit. Sorry about my english, Im spanish... ;-)

Don't apologize, your English is fine. That helps a lot. Thank you!

Look in the tutorials section here. Under Poser, the first tutorial link is on file types.