As stated Duane kindly passed me his solutoto this issue. Tonight was spent glued to the TV so I didn't get any work done, but I look forward to trying it out in the coming days.
As for my previous use of PROGMEM I actually did have it where you suggested and it caused distortions there as well. I began experimenting with the placement after a while, and that's what I ended up posting.
Thanks for the replies.