Carrara has really been shaping up to be a capable and feature-rich application for 3D stills and animation; and one for a very reasonable price. The latest release does not disappoint with a much cleaner interface and the addition of complex modeling functions (among other things!).

One seemingly overlooked addition in this release is the inclusion of a library of excellent looking shaders. In terms of rendering quality, Carrara has impressive speed and fantastic results.

My only major gripe is the speed of manipulating rigged characters. As you start to get towards some high-end models it can slow down much more than I would have expected. I will keep experimenting though!