I am looking forward to see this kind of rendering with zbrush, have anyone posted similar work before?
So far, I only use the 2.5D features and I am trying to get used to the unusual work flow. Its my dream tool and I intend to master it. 
The first one to answer āyep, SURELY!ā might run into some deep trouble, struggling to proove this, I guess!!
Your pic is outstanding, and I can think of absolutely NO reason to change the apps that you used to work this marvellous way!!!
Btw: you used------what ecactly??
The image is two years old, I use Animation Master and Photoshop and some clip-art.
I believe Zbrush can achieve better result judging from the gallery images.
Unfortunately A:Master is a stand alone software.
I am now working as a free-lancer and my first 3d program was Amorphium, quite limited so I bought Zbrush. Learning it is not as simple as it seems due to the work flow, also interested in Carrara-3 because it has 3d fur plug-in.
Any advice? I thing it will work hand in hand with Zbrush.
Btw. does anyone have any experience with Terragen? or how much will it cost?
Thanks.
I think Terragen was $75.00 U.S but donāt quote me on that!(Itās free for non- commercial use though.)
@filip: AnimationMaster is surely able to import/load .obj/.dxf formats??
Concerning Carrara (or any other modeller): Carrara went from spline-based editing to boxmodelling with the current version (3). This was discussed earlier: it depends all on
- what exactly you want to do/accomplish
- personal taste > you must be able to go along with the UI, without depending on the handbook to much - else every session will be a frustrating ātour de forceā.
So if I had said āMAX is what you are looking for!ā there will be others that will mention other softs as THE IDEAL partner for ZBrush.
Just get some demos and try (just some free ones: Gmax,Wings3D, MayaLearningEdition, etc).
Thanks for the insight, I was suspended from Animaster forum because I posted a few question on rendering defects, I didnāt know you can not do that.
I am setting up an affortable work station and I canāt use software which are free for now and expensive later.
What I am looking for is a program that has fur plug-in, able to read Auv tile and adequate light settings, Zbrush is very close but not quite. I donāt need animation tools at all.
Maybe Carrara-3 user here could offer me some information on the compatibity with Z brush I heard that they are not ashame to show and fix Bugs in their forum.
I want some 3D hair but canāt afford Light wave. US$ is four times my currency. 
Why not have a look at Cinema then? It has a plug for fur (and many other things), it has NO problems with ex-/imports to/from ZBrush, does a REAL good rendering job, and will not rob you like so many others!!
Carrara has a fine renderer, too - the handling of szenes, you got to get used to it (what I mentioned before: sometimes softs and user are incompatible )!
Good luck!!
you could use wings3d for poly modelling. Good, free, and open source. Not to mention based on Mirai, which is the tool used for modelling stuff like Gollum for the LOTR trilogy.
for a renderer, you can use Aqsis or 3Delight, which are free Renderman complaint renderers.
For animation and rigging and such, the cheapest application I can think of is messiah. Its extremely extremely powerfull [just ask some of the cgtalk-ers] not to mention great to use and easy to get used to.
so the pipeline can be
wings3d (modelling) --> Zbrush (texturing and such) --> messiah (rigging and animation) --> Aqsis or 3Delight (rendering).
its the cheapest but a powerfull pipeline I can think off.
I have downloaded Carrara-3 demo and found that texture mapping is unique but no UV mesh, UI is find but crash ( unknown errorā¦)
Rendering is very fast indeed. As for Cinema4D, well its tempting but too $$$$.
Having to utilise more then three programes is not viable for me, Thanks anyway Zbrush still have many great features in the comming years, just got carried away with FUR/hair.
Ok, last try: Truespace (http://www.caligari.com)! Cheaper then Cinema. They are selling beginning with version 4 (actual is 6.x). What I said for Cinema is true for Truespace with the exeption of fur (allthough: just for the gimmick of 3D hairā¦???).
Thanks a lot zerebrush, I did check out Truespace and will try out the demo soon.
At the mean time, I have got to read the ZZZbrush documentations, could not remember what Iāve read so farā¦