Spending way too much time figure out which program to start learning first. If anyone can illuminate me that would be great. This is the general conclusion I've reached:

Poser, Iclone, and DAZ are "cookie cutters", which I can use to get up and animating right away as long as I don't mind spending a lot of money on content.

Maya, 3DS, and Blender, are full-fledged programs which will allow me to do everything from scratch, meaning I need to invest much more time and effort before I can start making movies.

Is this correct at all?

Or, can I take those same pre-made characters and use them in Maya etc.? Can I alter them to become unique, thus finding some middle ground between originality and speed?

Or am I way off and I can actually use DAZ etc. to create totally unique characters if I want to?

I get the impression all the content available for iclone, poser and daz is created OUTSIDE of those programs in other programs, is that right?