You are all still missing the point and now starting to talk about me while I am in the room and continuing to get it wrong.

Therefore, even though not necessary, I will recap:

1. I am indeed on a path to purchasing the license and devoting significant time to a major application, probably Max but also maybe XSI or Cinema4D

2. Obviously, I would only be doing this if I thought what I want to accomplish is beyond the scope of Poser. So: STIPULATED: for certain functions, such as GI, architecture, landscape flyovers, crowd scenes, complex machinery, heavy raytrace with the goal of massive scene photorealism, Poser is inferior to the other programs; it was never intended to do those things.

3. My objection is to the totalizing of many people that the fact of point2 can be extrapolated to the broad characterization of "Poser is inferior to these other products, period." This is evidenced by an outright stubborn blindness in many to see that on the level of what I call 'intimate" scenes, Poser easily and proudly holds its own. In fact, a case could be made that  Poser is BETTER than those programs in this category. After all, there is significant lack of work evidenced in these areas; Max, XSI and Cinema, Carrara, Vue, Animation:Master artists do NOTE EVEN ATTEMPT to do major work in this arena. There is bluster that 'well, we can do "more", so why bother with these modest scenes" or "we could if we wanted to", but perhaps the reason is that they cannot attain the level of Poser.  The only person in this thread offering actual counter to this point is PJZ, with one render. 

Leaving aside "painters", more fantastic portraits, nude studies and small scenes are accomplished in Poser than in these other applications.

Now I am going to shut up about this for two reaons: 1) headed into vacation for a week; 2) i am in production of an 8-minute short film in this category in Poser -- i'd rather show you what I mean than continue to talk about it.

::::: Opera :::::