>I've had this problem intermittently, and no matter what I've tried, it still pops up. I've got a couple of buttons on a form that are set to hot-track (SpecialEffect = 2). Their Picture property is set via: ='images/myImage.bmp'. About 20% of the time, the buttons aren't painted until the mouse moves over them, at which point they appear. If I change the buttons to 3D, they work everytime.
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> I've tried setting the buttons to 3D initially, then in the Init(), or Show(), or Activate() setting them back to hot track, but it still fails. Has anyone else seen this behavior and/or have any work arounds for it?

Include the BMP files in your project. Add the EXTERNAL clauses before assigning the images to picture property:

External file myImage.bmp
ThisForm.MyButton.Picture = 'myImage.bmp'

Another possibility is to deploy your pictures along with your application executable.

HTH