I think it's a decent plan to just use Poser materials until you hit the limits (there are limits) and then see about Lux or other renderers.

If your renders fall short in Poser against other Poser renders (like mine) then it would be good to learn the basics first, and Poser can teach that.

Sure there are tons of goofy nodes in Poser but I don't use them, so why should you?

I use like 8 of them most of the time. (not counting math nodes - need all of those for procedural patterns - but you don't need those for image-based shaders or solid colors or one-node procedurals like Clouds)

You should know Diffuse and Blinn like the back of your hand. Once you understand those, move on to Fresnel_Blend and Reflect. Then maybe a little detour back into diffuse effects like Clay and then on to Scatter, finally Refract. That's the first 7 lighting nodes you should know.

A few visits to Color_Math, Math, and Blender will help with building combinations, but are not strictly necessary for a vast number of shaders.

The really weird stuff is when you try to make procedural patterns, like wood grain, or hexagonal tiles. But that's not basics.

 

 

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Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)