whichway, thanks for the glowing ball render, which had no lights?  I suspect that, as we now know how to reduce splotch artifacts or other occlusion errors, it might be a good opportunity to try bill's no-light scene comprised of a glowing plane illuminating a figure through the doorway inside a closed room, if you are willing to give it a try.  AFAIK, a specular component in the glowing posersurface has no effect, as FFRender doesn't currently support indirect specular calculations.