Well I just signed up and thought I should introduce myself.
I suppose I will start with my history of 3d applications. My first real feel into 3d was back in high school with AutoCAD 3d I played with that countless times, looking back I don’t even know how I put up with it lol. After high school I started studding Mechanical Drafting which also gave me access to Inventor, once again spending hours just making stuff, absolutely loved it.
I ended up dropping out, not really knowing what I wanted to do. Fortunately I fell into a civil drafting role and have been enjoying that for the last 6 years. This has also giving me the opportunity to learn a program called 12D it is a civil package that aids in creating roads, stormwater, and sewer in 3d. This was also a very different package as the UI is not what most are used to.
Then I meet someone at work who is now a good friend, he was starting to learn 3D and was using Blender 2.48, introduced me to it and I was hooked. Once I realised what I could do I wanted incorporate that into my line of work. After a bit of research I came across Dynamite VSP, now for those of you who are not familiar with this, it was an add-on to 3DS Max that allowed me to import my 3d road designs apply trees and cars and what not very quickly and easily. I could have a video in 24 hours, so the speed and ease of the application was great.
So that was great but also meant that I had to drop Blender and learn 3DS Max. To this day I still despise 3DS Max. So a few years pass and I am trying to push this software at my work to no anvil. Bit depressed I started playing with blender again now using 2.5 and really liking the new UI and lux render.
Then I move on from my work and to another company that dose do Visualizations, YAY but once again having to use 3DS Max 
. None the less I have been using it, I must say that I love the material node setup in max really easy to use, but modelling in max is just so hard it completely puts me off of it.
So currently I am trying to use Blender at my work and I think I have a job coming up where I might use the new VFX for, which is very exciting, it is also a high profile job, meaning there will be lots of news coverage and public viewing so really hoping I might get a video on TV :D. Meanwhile I still use 3DS Max for most of my work, and at home use Blender as much as I can.
So that is a bit about me, and am very excited to be a part of this community, hoping to learn lots and hopefully give back. Here is my most recent render, the wheels came from a guy on my car club modelled in Inventor, I then made it a bit bigger and gave it lost of dish . I used a material node I found in the cycles test thread can’t remember the users name though. Feel free to give me advice on the image as that is what I am here for.
Thanks
Oh I should also mention you will notice the centre of the wheels come out a bit funky, this is because it is triangulated and not quads. I try attempting to fix it but there is just to many tri’s so I have just left it.