Phil,

Check if using a bitmap image file instead of JPEG helps. Read comments to this code sample:

Creating irregularly shaped FoxPro form using transparency color key
http://www.news2news.com/vfp/?example=33&function=789

My guess: when FoxPro loads JPEG file, the image data is unpacked and converted to a memory bitmap. During this conversion some colors may change to slightly different values. You know that JPEG format may apply some distortion to data to get better compression. That's how the transparency color may disappear completely from the image.

Hope it makes sense :) and I'm not talking rubbish.