C4D is my general 3D program of choice. 3DMax is good but the company refused to recognize me as a valid user as I bought an old copy on ebay. So I gave it to a fried and got C4D instead. C4D is powerful and every 3D progarm has its own way of doing thing. I downloaded DAZ Studio last week and have not yet figured out how to combine it with C4D. I also ordered Poser 5 on its $49 sale. That has not arrived yet. Check out the one C4D tutorial for doing atmospherics. It takes much more setup than Bryce or Vue but you have more control once you do. The problem with Poser, Bryce, and so on is that once you see a dozen image made with that software they all start to look too similar.  C4D, like 3DMax, LW, is a powerful general 3D program that allows you to go beyond the look of other programs. But it takes work.

Henry