I've never understood the rush to "realism."  In the beginning, realism in CGI was nigh impossible, so people worked with what they had, and it was good.  Take for example the CGI in the Dire Straits video, "Money for Nothing"; it was crude, colourful, and delightful.  Likewise Tron; the limits of the technology defined the entire style of the movie.

Fast forward 20 years, and now everyone is trying to turn their computer into a camera.  Why?  If I wanted a photograph, I could buy a $5 digital camera and achieve more "realism" than anyone here can with a $3000 computer and years of expertise.  It baffles me why anyone would WANT realism in their CGI.  I can understand wanting the ability to do realism, since that kind of software and processing power has other possibilities.  Realism is where art STARTS, not where it ends.  Picasso began by learning how to paint a photorealistic bowl of fruit; once he had mastered that as a basic, then he moved on, to his benefit and ours.

I've started using IDL in Poser, and I'm finding myself diddling around in PhotoShop, unhappy with the result.  When I'm done, I realize that the finished result looks similar to what the old Poser renderer produced natively, a sort of cartoony, posterized, oversaturated, 70s airbrush look.  Rather than playing to CGI's weaknesses and plummeting helplessly iinto the Uncanny Valley, I'd rather use its strengths and produce something which could not be created with any other medium.

Why are so many people around here treating photorealism as the Holy Grail of Poser?