The problem is, that you create the bitmap at runtime. name contains only the name of an object, like when you name the object in WED (EDIT: That's just a guess of mine!!). I don't know how to retrieve the filename. Have a look for yourself in atypes.h. The last code you wrote is nonsense. You're declaring an array of 50 char pointers. The second code example should work. Are you sure these lines are producing the crash? Or have anything else behind these lines?