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Hi all, I'm an architecture graduate currently employed at a small architectural and planning firm. I need to up my skill set before returning to do my masters in the Autumn, and since where I work only uses SketchUp, I need to go about learning more advanced software outside of work hours in order to be nuts when I go back to uni. I'm basically asking the best way to go about learning Revit and 3DsMax. I can use AutoCAD and Google SketchUp no problem. I have once learnt the basics of 3DsMax before at university, but have mostly forgotten about it as I never used it. So... Should I learn one first, then the other, or learn at the same time? Are there any good tutorials that come in some sort of set or order for both? Or is it best to just fiddle about with it with a made up project or a real project? Any suggestions about anything related are welcome. I'm sure something similar to this must have been posted before but I couldn't find anything. So if this has been answered before feel free to drop a link. Thanks in advance P.S - This is the first time I've ever used any sort of forum, so how do I go about using it effectively?

First post ever, and I am asking for help... I've got a sketch-up model (and full disclosure, there are objects from 3d Warehouse in the file) that occasionally renders fine, but not always. When I got to render my scene, the initial pass through (prior to the render rectangles) seems to show the desired lighting level I want, but as soon as the rectangles come up, it renders a dark scene. Its not totally black, but it appears that its not rendering my general environmental light. It does show all my modeled lights though. Being the novice I am at Vray - I followed the message boards; I have under global switches, lights, default lights, hidden lights, and shadows checked. Also, under Environment, I have a GI Color Set and a value of 11.0. I have included an image of my most recent render showcasing the problem. What's odd, is that just last week it rendered absolutely fine. Could it be an object within my model causing this to happen? I appreciate any thoughts on this. Thanks!