There are a couple of important rules to remember when working with trans-maps. The first is that the black on the map must be RGB 0,0,0 (absolute black). If you use (for example) RGB 10,10,10 you'll get partial transparency instead. Shades of grey give varying amounts of transparency while pure white (255,255,255) gives zero transparency. The colour of the object can be anything - although if you plan on using a texture-map on the object it should be white. The high-light colour has to be black (0,0,0) otherwise you get ghost edges and surfaces showing up where the high-lights are. Hope this helps but, if you've still got a problem, post an image of your trans-map here on the forum and I'll take a look at it for you Paul