PSE7 Slide Show causes PRE7 to crash

[Ron Hunter]

I used PSE7 to create a 7 minute photo slideshow, which I exported to PRE7 with Std. Def. 4:3 miniDV settings. I added a few titles within PRE7, then pressed "Enter" to render the timeline. After a few minutes I received the following "Video Preview Error" message:
"Error compiling movie.
Out of memory."

I rebooted, closed unnecessary programs, launched PRE and assigned it "High Priority" within Task Manager, then tried rendering the timeline again. Same crash.

Dell PC: Intel Core 2 Duo, 2.14GHz, 4GB RAM, 256MB video card, OS=Vista. PRE, PSE, and all media files are on 1TB internal HDD, OS is on separate internal HDD.

What am I doing wrong? Do I need to export the timeline to a separate project, render that timeline with no edits, export timeline as AVI, then pull that AVI back into the original slideshow project?

Thanks!

[Steve Grisetti]

You're not saying that your operating system and/or program files are on something other than your C drive, are you? Taht would not be a good thing.

That said, the first question is, Have you resized your photos to no larger than 1000x750 pixels, as we recommend in our books? Oversized photos (and those directly from a camera can be 20 times our recommended size!) are the most common cause of crashes while creating slideshows.

[Ron Hunter]

All photos are resized to be no more than 1000x750. The OS is on the internal C drive. Media files are on internal F drive (different physical drive).

[Chuck Engels]

That should not happen at all with a 7 minute slideshow, I don't care how big your pictures are.
How big is your page file/virtual memory, do you know?

couple of things to try;
1. Share/Personal Computer/AVI - see if it will export the movie.

2. Do a 'Save As' and then try to render the timeline with the new saved copy.

3. Check for any spaces on the timeline, zoom in really close and check the whole timeline.
You can probably eliminate some of the problem areas by reducing the space the Work Area Bar is covering. Pressing Enter will only render the area covered by the work area bar. Reducing the work area bar will probably let you render parts of the timeline, when you get the error again it will give you a good idea where the bad spot is. Could be a transition, a gap in the timeline, an effect gone wild, hard to say but try and narrow it down.

[John 'twosheds' McDonald]

PRE, PSE, and all media files are on 1TB internal HDD, OS is on separate internal HDD.

You're not saying that your operating system and/or program files are on something other than your C drive, are you? Taht would not be a good thing.

Just to clarify Steve's question, are you saying that that Vista is on your C: drive but the programs are installed on a different drive?

[Ron Hunter]

Vista, PRE7 and PSE7 are all installed on C drive. Media files and catalogs are stored on F internal drive.

I gave up on my initial approach and found success as follows:
- I exported the PSE slideshow to a separate PRE project, rendered the timeline and exported as AVI.
- I imported the AVI into the intended PRE project, inserted some titles, rendered timeline and exported as AVI.
- Pulled that AVI into yet a 3rd PRE project, applied a preset to scale the clip to 4:3 settings, and exported that as DVD.

A hassle, but I got it done. I must say I am leery of using PSE's slide show editor now, and I have a 300 photo slideshow to crank out by this Sunday too!

Chuck, thanks for your troubleshooting tips, I'll try them tonight.