Latest Den + composites

With the crash of my last save, this project has officially become a monster. Arg!

I'll need to revert back to an earlier version then do some serious compositing.

My, Oh Maya: The Den

And finally...

I spent the past few days trying to get a decent bear-skin rug, but couldn't negotiate around an ugly masking job. I don't know if anyone else has any luck, but I'm here to say that mental ray and even ray-tracing will--in one way or another--force maya to crash an already taxed processor when trying to merge fur.

That said, I'm saving my pennies for a Mac, since my days of futzing with pc hardware (and even knowing about it) need to be over. What kind of professional needs futz??