You are not alone Risus.

I felt that way as well when I first started. But Its just like the movie-set when you get to see how the Wizard of Oz really works...

oh, bluescreen behind the actors? wheres the spaceship set???
oh, pause camera, replace with dummy, roll-em! "SQUISH!"
actors reading off teleprompers???

Its all smoke and mirrors, unless you really want to re-render re-render re-render... rechecking till you get it all perfect.

Hobbists try to be the best at every aspect of 3D: ideas, concepts, modeler, shaders, poser, camera/render man... (some cases animator as well)
Reality is, when you are a pro, you end up likely doing only ONE of those things and leave the rest of the process to other pros.

So, as a hobbist do the best you can, copy/paste, fake depth-of-fields, recolor/post-process to your hearts desire. Use everything and anything to make it look good.
Yes, you can get flawless results like you see on the professional Poser covers made by troop of professionals.

I face the same thing with music these days, digital recordings edited and fixed to flawlessness... but it sounds like a robot performed it.
I can make my guitar lose its soul by killing its imperfections.
Grab the gimp/photoshop and have fun and love your creations ;)
Thats why it's art.

Carrara 7 Pro, Anime Studio Pro 8, Hexagon 2.5, Zbrush 4.6, trueSpace 7.6, and Corel Draw X3. Manga Studio 4EX, Open Canvas 5, WACOM Cintiq 12WX User