And one thing that you don't want to forget about Carrara, it was made to be approachable and easy to learn/use. You cannot say that about Maya or some of the other Big Boys. Yeah they use them to make movies, but of course you pay a whole lot more to get that ability, and the learning curve is usually a lot steeper. Just play with Maya PLE and tell me that it is as easy to jump in and create a nice render without reading a manual. It has menus upon menus and you are not going very far without a tutorial or manual. XSI has some impressive features, and for some things, you simply would be hard pressed to perform the same on Carrara, although I have seen some amazing things that would compare. But you also get the Big Boy price. Of course on a Carrara forum, people are going to defend their favorite tool to the bitter end. ;-) Paul