Quote - Fabulous, this looks = to a Mental Ray/Brazil quality!

Thanks! Interesting you point that out.

Fig 1. Not Vue, but Podium

Just like TerraPak where I started by trying to emulate the best parts of a more simple yet beautiful renderer (Terragen,) this new interior pak is being created by copying some of the best features of a simple renderer called Podium which works with SketchUp. The picture you see above is from a model which was found on the Podium forum, and rendered by another artist.

In this Podium render (Fig 1), you can see a bit more light bleeding than in the Vue one, and there's even a bit smoother gradation of the picture. But, there are a number of things Podium can't do that Vue can, so my goal was to try and squeeze the most from a Vue render to make it as photoreal as possible, without incurring impossible render times. Here's the same model rendered in Vue (Fig 2)

Fig 2. Vue Render

One of the things I'm focussed on is how to create a simple and easy to follow recipe for those who need/want to create interior shots. Neither of these 3 renders shown use any lights other than ambient. So, that's not too difficult a lighting rig to setup, eh?

BTW, I should also mention, you can use the free version of Google SketchUp and the free OBJ exporter plugin found at:
http://sketchuptips.blogspot.com/2007/01/wavefront-obj-exporter.html
to create detailed interiors and import them in to Vue. Not to mention Google Warehouse has a slew of great furniture and other models...and it's all free.