Took me a few on that one too..

Just run through the manual to get a feel for the tools, and do the tutorial that is included. This will give you the understanding of positive and negative attributes to form complex objects, as well as some foundation on the materials.

As Jafo states, it is easy to use the presets, but that is how you will gain an understanding of the tools. I believe the learning curve on any of the 3D scene programs will have a similarly "steepness" to begin with.

Once you get the math part (understanding where your object is in relation to the origin coordinates) you should be on your way. You can use the mini menu (seen next to an object when selected) with the little "A" (Attributes used to set the location) on top and the "M" (Materials lab) on the bottom - to place the object in relation to the center of your scene and to assign a material to it.

Hint - There are two types of coordinates used in the 3D space:

1 = Global location expressed using the X, Y, and Z coordinates based on the center of the scene (or world) which is always 0, 0, 0.

2 = Relative location expressed using the X, Y, and Z coordinates based on the center of the object. This describes parts of an object in relation to itself (such as a persons head in relation to their center).

Other helpful items:

1 - On top of the scene you will see the words "Create", "Edit", and "Sky & Fog". Clicking on these show the tools for use.

2 - Clicking the small arrow head to the right of the words listed in #1 will invoke the presets available for those categories.

There is also a nice assortment of tutorials on the DAZ web site to get you going.

Hang in there, Lantec.