Hi Mike, long time no see.. Thanks for your reply, basically, the reason that it gets dark is the bump, the bump darkens things up considerably... Even though the example picture is light, I was just using it to show the texture and the way light reflects off it... The one that i got on the teapot was the closest I got it... :) So yeah, maybe it's something that Vue is not up to... And maybe the makers of Vue did have that bad experience... :) sorry to hear that your efforts weren't rewarded, I thought maybe it was me alone... Maybe that should be next month's challenge, make a convincing brushed stainless steel - aluminum texture... :)