> I am a purist at heart and hate image_maps so I feel the site should only
> contain procedural textures.

how is it that procedural textures are more 'pure' than imagemaps? 
aren't they both art?  isn't the idea to make the best image as
possible?  why is a limited toolbox better than a full one?  do
mechanics try to fix cars with only cresent wrenches?  do carpenters
only use hammers and saws?  even ancient woodworkers had a multitude of
tools to choose from.  should painters only use oil paints?  should
sculpters only use marble?  i love povray and i love procedural
textures, but i don't appreciate 'holier than thou' attitudes about the
way a 3d image should be made.  pov vs expensive package, procedural vs
nonprocedural, hand scripted vs modeled; it's all a bunch of nonsense. 
certainly, when someone makes a superior image based only on hand coded
script and procedural textures, praise is well earned.  however, you may
have noticed, this rarely happens.  the best images from pov have come
from those artists like gilles tran and h.e. day who have as many tools
as they can get their hands on and have learned when and when not to use
them.  and what about professionals?  have they all gone to the 'dark
side' because they use tools other than pov?  are their images worth
less than an advanced pov image?  i don't think so.  of course, you (and
many readers here) may disagree, but i wanted to get my opinion out
there.

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