If you buy a nice car, and then pretty it up with a bunch of aftermarket add-ons and a custom paint job done by somebody else, it might look impressive to a lot of people.

But it's not going to impress the guy down at the garage who builds his own cars from the engine out, including fabricating the custom fiberglass body pieces. He knows that your skills don't match his... and he's RIGHT! If he wants to laugh at your car, there's not much you can say about it.

That's the issue with Poser - the quality of the finsihed work is only a PARTIAL reflection of the skill of the artist. It's also a reflection of the skill of the artists whose purchased items went into making up the image. It's the difference between using Stonemason's awesome sets for a background vs. being able to build and texture sets as well as Stonemason does. Looking at the final image, you'd be hard pressed to tell if the creator is a great talent, or just a half-decent hack who had the sense to incorporate someone else's great talent.

Unfortunately, even if the guy at the garage DOESN'T laugh at your car, chances are the idiot that works with him will. You know who I mean... that guy who thinks he's a hot-shot mechancic, but reallly the boss only lets him do oil changes, tire rotations and sweeping up, because he makes a mess of anything else he's given. Even though he hasn't earned the right to feel superior the way his co-worker has, he still does - just because he works in the same shop. Such is human nature.

As for the interview (and MANY, MANY other situations) a good rule of thumb is never volunteer information. Of course, they did ask you directly what you used. If you want to be cagey, you can always come back with something like "I've got a number of apps in my toolkit... I usually take an eclectic approach. I always think the work is more important than the tools used to create it."

• Jimdoria  ~@>@