griggs, I don't find Bryce difficult to use - that's the real reason I use it. The 'hardest' thing of all is not being able to use interesting options because the render time runs into weeks. This is further exacerbated by Bryce5, which has some very nice new render features but is even all round slower than previous versions. I know it is possible to make Lightwave (and the others) grind to a halt by enthusiastic settings, but I also know that feature for feature, Lightwave will be quicker than Bryce. Indeed, a radiosity calculation for a fairly complex scene will be much quicker than Bryce trying to simulate it with soft shadows and 'true ambience' - and it only has to be done once for camera animations. And you have to admit; the feature set of Lightwave is light-years ahead of Bryce. If the rumours for the upcoming 'light' Lightwave are true, the content will still be vast. 'Inspire' is already tremendous value for money, and if the new effort is in keeping with that price point it will be hard to resist the temptation. Despite my love of Bryce, my fiddling with the demo of Bryce5 is leaving me underwhelmed. Combined with the reality that it is disturbingly slower than Bryce4 with the same scenes (much slower than I was expecting), I feel like I'm being hit with a big stick. If someone dangles a nice juicy carrot in front of me, I'll probably start climbing the steep learning curve after it.