We had an employee photo directory that was using a GENERAL field and the DBF was huge and it took forever to print. So what I did was save the path in a field of the database using a filenaming convention (i.e. lastname_first.bmp) then I placed an OLE control on the report and told it to take the "Picture From" the following FILE ->

iif(file(photo_path), photo_path,"S:\photos\employee\blank.bmp")

where "Photo_Path" is the field and the BLANK.BMP is in case the BMP is not there for that employee, then it won't print "file not found" on the report, but rather just a blank.

Also, I found out that JPG's won't work, so I convert them to BMP for this.

Hope this helps,
Doug Symes
Interconnect Wiring,LP