Quote - I'm not willing to lose the power of the new rendering options in firefly for some modest quality gain in another platform. I'm with the group who says you are not going to get results in those other systems that you can't get by learning the nuances of firefly.

Very true - to a point, the point being caustics. Firefly doesn't do caustics, and has a pretty odd way to do IOR as I recall. You can fake it to some degree, but you will either spend a lot of additional setup time adding the lights in "just the right places", carefully add the effecs in post, or end up with a render right in the middle of Uncanny Valley. True, this isn't a big issue for most renders, but for things like jewels, glass, many liquids, and of course rendering Vicky in a tomb with a crystal skull, caustics can really make a difference.

For example, note the caustics in the cystals in this render:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=2323823

The concentrated light on the face of the figure in the crystal is from the gathering of refracted light in that area. Also look at the subtle light "highlights" at and around the base of the crystal, these subtle effects that add to the realism simply aren't possible in Firefly (but can be faked to a certain degree with additional lights and gel shaders for the lights).

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