The present invention is a method of coating a substrate in a single zone of a MSVD coater wherein the zone includes at least two bays, comprising running a first bay of a zone including a first target in metal mode and running the second bay including a second target in transition or oxide mode, wherein the ΔG of formation of the target oxide being run in transition mode or oxide mode is equal to or less than −160 kcal/mole O2 or the difference in ΔG between the target being run in transition mode or oxide mode and the target being run in metal mode is at least 60 kcal/mole O2.