Looks like my shadow from transparent objects was due to the renderer (raytracer works fine). Thanks for the pointers above.

Link below has an image rendered with Ray Tracer with a shader similar to the one above on the dress.

I've left the faerie's dress somewhat transparent to demonstrate partial transparency which I was having trouble getting right in carrara. The dress has both partial transparency and full transparency with no transition shininess. (The dress mesh is one of the Poser 5 dresses with straps over the shoulder and transparency removes the straps and scallops the hem.)

In the process also realized that poser used transparency for eyebrows and applied a similar shader to the eyebrows to get rid of my racoon look ;-). This image also changes the lights sources which cleared up many of the other funny shadows on the faerie in the earlier link.

Thanks for the help

Marc

http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=381451