Hello there, I have some questions and need some suggestions. Hope you dont laugh at me ! :P Okay here we go - as I know every 3d program have their own render engine and its determining result of the image after final render. So - this means exactly same scene looks different for example, after a Bryce render and a Cinema 4D render. Same scene, same textures, same light conditions and different result. Don't worry I will not ask why ! :D But... When I create a scene on Bryce and add a radial light with cast shadows function, render slows down dramatically. When I do the same thing in Cinema 4D nothing happens, I mean its not slowing down. Imagine whats happening when I create a radial light dome on Bryce for simulate radiosity ! I know that Lightwave can render global illumination scenes in minutes. It took days, even weeks in Bryce or Vue. But one of my friends told me that the render engines of Bryce and Vue are more powerful than high-end applications like Cinema 4D or Lightwave - and thats the reason of this programs success. Is it right or they are just easy to use ? Frankly its very easy to setup a scene in Bryce or Vue. Thats why I use Cinema 4D for only modeling... So should I keep using Bryce and Vue for setup and final render my scenes or should I jump to a high end application to make eveything in same program. I have Cinema 4D, I am planing to buy Lightwave 8.0... Thanks for taking time to read...

Isn't it more a question of personal desires? You almost answered your question yourself in the above. Each program has its own pros and cons, each has a specific look (and feel). When i did professional computer animation (last century) i think in 90% of the cases i was able to say in which software something was rendered. A question of knowledge about the capabilities and specific things of each software. Try things out and see what you prefer - look at images in the specific galleries (Cinema, Bryce, Lightwave etc) and see what you are impressed about most. And look at your bank acount - what you can afford to buy. If you already have Cinema look carefully wether Lightwave will bring the big step forward that you expect. Maybe there is a demo version as well that you can try out. What not too many people pook at right now is Softimage (www.softimage.com). They have a new price system and a starter package on Windows that is incredible pricewise. You can download a demo to see how it is, the results in the gallery there are VERY impressive.