OK and thanks for the tips thus far: Well I have made a thread on this before, BUT not exactly for specifically ASKING for a tutorial: ANYHOO, I need a tutorial (w/screen shots) for animating an explosion of a spaceship, and how to make it disappear after the "height" of the explosion, also how to do lazers, AND how to do the cloaking/decloaking effect from the Star Trek series. See I'm just afraid to post another thread on this... I have tried the one at (I think) BryceTech, and itwas with NOT enough information for me to follow, it looked horrible so I have done my homework to try and rectify this problem, seriously. I CAN ANIMATE the movements of ships and all, NOT the above effects, that's what I'm having trouble with, the three attempts I tried, I was close to kicking the (insert expletive here) out of my comp. Can you say FRUSTRATION. I looked through the manual, no luck there. So, what's a guy to do???? NO IDEA, I REALLY AM EAGER to learn, I AM a visual learner, w/software, and am quite good w/practice, I just need some help here. Another Q: SO, should I have asked this in this FORUM, OR in the ANIMATION forum? Just wondering???? AGAIN< THANK YOU EVERYONE, for your help, writes down reminder to include renderosity.com in the moviecredits What say ye?