Just in case someone does a search for the same problem here is how I fixed my problem.

The edge right before the geometry curves up to make the lip. It was slightly lower than the rest of the...

That is orginally how I crafted the piece. Except I did not use the poly count option. I didn't know there was one, I'm enjoying this Maya adventure, I learn something new everyday.

also I just tried a couple of the options given to raise the face count. They helped, the effect is much less pronounced now, say only 5 or times around the plate. But I undid, and did a smooth and...

Here's the wire as requested. Hopefully you'll be able to see what you are looking for.

Ok been trying to learn the whole shading/texturing thing since that is my biggest challenge. However as I have been playing around texturing different models I'm making I've found this strange...

Why not just make a composite video of your models / scenes. For example a few seconds of a car model, fade out, and fade into a character model. You could do camera work to make it interesting, but...