Does anyone render in passes?

Repeating myself, does anyone render in passes?
Do you do it in IRay (in case you do it with DAZ Studio)?
For those in the dark, rendering in passes is a technique where you render several different parts of your scene separately, and mount it all in a compositing software (like GIMP or Photoshop).
You render the background, the foreground, the mid-ground, the characters, the props, all in different passes.
It allows for more control of lighting and it reduces rendering time considerably. But it requires some skills and I haven't tried that yet.
I would love to hear from someone who does it though.
Cheers
Mortze
Do you do it in IRay (in case you do it with DAZ Studio)?
For those in the dark, rendering in passes is a technique where you render several different parts of your scene separately, and mount it all in a compositing software (like GIMP or Photoshop).
You render the background, the foreground, the mid-ground, the characters, the props, all in different passes.
It allows for more control of lighting and it reduces rendering time considerably. But it requires some skills and I haven't tried that yet.
I would love to hear from someone who does it though.
Cheers
Mortze