Using Amapi does have it's virtues; just check out some of Brycetech's modeling. It seems to me that Amapi is the silent, gifted orphan somehow. If buying Shamm's book has any redeeming element, it is that it includes an older version of Amapi on the CD. (4.15 or something). I upgraded to V. 6 because it is kinda neat. In LW you can't select an edge of an object and radius it, for example, so I often export .obj into Amapi, radius, and then reimport into LW. I find they interface really goofy, but it certainly is surprising how well it works. Brycetech has a tutorial CD on Renderosity for $10.00 or $12.00 and I'm going to pick it up soon. If only the interface didn't bug me so much....