Thanks so very much for all the info and suggestions. If I am understanding this correctly, I can save the ripple effect as a bitmap and then apply that bitmap as a fill? That might work. Yes Mike, that is exactly what I wanted to do - thank you. Ben, I'll try that too - I'm always trying the combine shapes/intersect - I like the way that works...most of the time! Thanks very much for the help; as always, it is greatly appreciated! I do however, still think that an eraser tool would be handy to have...