Although the final version isn't out yet. I would still turn the question around, how is Poser better then DAZ Studio? I had some problems with running the application at first, but that was due to the fact I tried to open some P5 figures and then DS crashes. 1. Content, even though DS is free it lacks content. Poser comes with lots of content, which makes it great. If one doesn't own Poser, but only DS, you would need to buy the content at DAZ itself for example. Soon this nice free tool won't be to free anymore. 2. Poser 5 has great features like dynamic hair, no support for that in DS (yet?). 3. Rendering. Even thoug I don't use P5 render engine much (due to bringing most of my P5 content to Vue4), the DS render engine has only a few option and the renders don't look as vivid as in Poser. 4. While DS starts up fast, Poser content loads rather slow. 5. Animating Poser figures will distort the mesh quite badly at times. Just bend a leg a little and move it to the side a little and the mesh will be all over the place. 6. DS crashes when trying to open P5 figures that are prepared with dynamic hair and conforming clothes. 7. DS reminds me of P4 too much, it's seems to be way behind P5. After playing with DAZ Studio for a while, I do not see any reason for me as a Poser 5 user to continue using DS at all. It's way behind P5, lacks all the cool features P5 has, lacks the rendering power P5 offers, only really opens P4 stuff succesfully (especially when using hair and such). Lacks any content and buying DAZ content (what they most likely want you to do) will make it quite expensive compared to P5.

AgentSmith, I did never get around to doing it, they're are so many forums around, but do expect me more often here now, I've pulled up some good info from the forums already and instead of visiting lot's of forums it seems a good concentration of 3D forums here. By the way I also made my first purchase here after 4 years :)

I've been a Bryce 5 user for quite a while, until I purchased P5 and wanted to import P5 figures with dynamic hair and dynamic clothes into B5. There wasn't any way to do it. I looked at Vue 4 Esprit too, but that one couldn't do it either until they recently released Mover 5. So i purchased Vue 4 Esprit (not pro) + Mover 5. Sure it's much more pricy then Bryce 5, it cost me almost 300 euros, but it's worth it. I do find the whole application much easier to use and the results are stunning. It import P5 figures without a problem (just make sure you convert any .png texture to .tiff or so, Vue4 doesn't read .png files yet) and thr rendering in Vue4 is so much better then Bryce 5. Imho Bryce is a toy compared to Vue 4. I've noticed DAZ is working on importing poser content though a plugin called Turbo Import for Bryce 5. But you still need DAZ Studio too. No direct link between Poser and Bryce, you need to go through DAZ Studio. I wanted to try the thing but I've got the same problem as you do, Daz studio would not run on my system, it crashed time after time. A new system is not in my immediate future, I've just got one. I'll stick with Poser 5 + Vue 4 & Mover 5 (mover 5 isn't a seperate application, but it upgrades Vue 4 to Vue 4 Mover), seemless integration, no hassle. Bryce + DAZ Studio + Poser 5 + Turbo Import for Bryce 5 seems like trouble to me. Besides that it isn't real Poser 5 import anyway, you'll open your P5 figures in DAZ Studio and export them out of it and import that content into Bryce 5. I'm not even sure if dynamic hair + clothing is supported at all. Couln't test it due to the many crashes. Just a quote from DAZ: "Simply load Poser content into DAZ|Studio, export out of DAZ|Studio, then load Bryce 5 and import your recently exported content." It wasn't simple, need of an extra application, Bryce 5 is outdated, even the Poser 5 does a better Job in rendering then Bryce 5 does. Besides that all of the stuff needed from DAZ is still in beta, don't want to rely on betas for production (DAZ Studio and Turbo Import ore both still in beta). Quote from E-On Software: "Thanks to Vue and Mover 5, your Curious Labs' Poser characters can experience the joys of high quality rendering and truly realistic natural 3D environments!" Correct statement, it was even beyond my expectations. Perhaps a future version of Bryce may change the whole story, but as long as there's no true direct link between Poser & Bryce I'm not even considering buying it.

"No, it brings in the regular Poser texture maps." That's incorrect info though.... I've got P5 + Vue4 Esprit + Mover 5 and created an angel in P5 with uses a gold reflection shader. When importing the figure, V4 asks me to locate the gold reflection shader and for sure loads and renders it. It does the dynamic hair and conforming & dynamic clothes well too. They work very well together and I don't regret spending the money on getting it at all.

"This may convert a Vue person over..." Which version of Vue do you own? Although I've used Bryce5 for a long time, I've rencently switched to Vue4 (not the pro version) with Mover 5. I wanted to get my poser 5 figures with dynamic clothing and hair into Bryce and there was no way to do it. So I did get Vue4 Esprit + Mover 5 and it rocks, makes Bryce 5 look like a toy. I've just noticed that DAZ purchased Bryce 5 and saw that their aiming at integration between Poser/DAZ Studio/Bryce 5 and do have a tool to import Poser figures directly into Bryce, though you need DAZ Studio too. Tried it but had no luck at all, only had crashes.... I'll stick with Vue4 for sure, no crashes and good integration with Poser5 and crisp looking landscapes!