Thanks for the reply.
The zooms are the standard Ultimate S Pro Sony peels transitions. I don't know what they are, but they don't look like deep zooms to me. All images are .jpg
At 54% there seems to be an 4932 x 3708 x 24 image.

Is it your theory that this is too large? Is so, is this a specified limitation or a lesson from the school of hard knocks?

It's from the school of hard knocks :-)
A look through this forum will reveal several posts where folks have had similar issues and a batch resize solved their problems.
As I said, IrfanView (it's free) has a batch resize option and it would go through your images very quickly.

At 54% there seems to be an 4932 x 3708 x 24 image.

If all your images are that size, then definitely do a batch resize on all of them.

Mike

Thanks.
I'm working with IrfanView. Should I be batch resizing the images using the advanced feature, or should I be reducing the "quality" using the regular batch options?

File - Batch Conversion/Rename;
Click the "Batch Conversion" button;
Select the "Output Format" (I Prefer PNG but JPG is OK);
CHoose Output Directory;
Browse to the folder and select "Add All";
Click "Use Advanced Options" and click "Advanced";
Click "Resize" and set new size as a percentage;
Click "Preserve Aspect Ratio" and "Use Resample Function";
Click OK and watch it run.

If you selected PNG as the output format, the best way to tell Vegas what to do is to delete the original JPEGS (copy them somewhere else first), copy the PNGs to the original folder and launch Vegas.
When it can't find the first one, it'll ask you what to do.
Browse to the folder and tell it to use the PNG file instead.
It should say something like " I also found PNG002 in that folder. Should I use it?".
Say "Yes" and it should automatically load the rest of them.
Save the file under a new name and you should be OK.

Mike

Thanks.
I tried scaling each image over 6MB by 75%, so that the largest image file is now about 7 MB (before, it was 23MG).
Unhappily, using these new image files, the render freezes in exactly the same place.
Anything else I should try?

I have had the scenario you describe with huge pictures, but for me, when it appeared that the render stopped, it really did not stop. It was just at a point where it takes a really, really, really long time to render.

Unless Vegas is crashing, let it run for 8 or so hours and see if it finishes up. It should.

Just as a matter of test, try taking the picture to 720 x 480, 72 pixels per inch and see how that works.

I don't know the specific implication of Ultimate S, however, Sony tech support has told me that photos on the timeline can create problems. The number, their varying sizes, FX, etc. The software chokes.

I had a similar problem, which is why I called them. I watched the render to isolate the misbehaving photo. After altering the size it worked...until another image. On the later image, I had to alter the FX slightly to get it to work. But it did.

from my experience, and that's using a lot of pics with moves on the t/l - converting them all to .png, and only enlarging the ones i need to zoom in on, i've never had a problem. i try to keep most my .png's around the 3mb mark @ around hd screen size - those required for zoom can get up to 12mb @ double or slightly more than hd size.

if i'm looking for ULTRA zoom, i use two pics and cross dissolve to the cu - get much, much better resolution that way....

leslie

Thanks for all the comments. I've finally gotten it to work, for now, by making every image 6M or smaller. All in all, Vegas seems a remarkably delicate mechanism given its reputation as an industrial strength program, but of course I'm just a hobbyist.

...by making every image 6M or smaller

Even that can be too big if you have a lot of them.
You said earlier that the image at the 54% mark was 4932 x 3708 in size.
Since this is for standard DVD, I maintain that that's far too large (it's over 7X your project resolution) unless you're doing a really deep zoom.
The images from my digital camera are 2896 x 1944 (2.0 - 2. 7 MB in size) JPEGs.
I can do a 500 image timeline with no problems whatsoever on my QX6700 quad core.

Vegas is far from being an industrial strength program.
You have to know its limitations and work with them.

Mike

This is a "this is your life" montage, so the photos date from 1986 to present. If I have further problems, I'm guessing I should further reduce the sizes to about 3000 x 2000? I'm also using a QX6700 quad core machine.

why on earth do you need 3k X 2k pics unless you're zooming or panning to any major degree?

edited:

and you're not even in HD!!!! considering you're going out in sd - you're going for total overkill in size...

leslie (ushere) is right.
My first response said "The usual recommendation is that if you're not doing deep zooms, go no more than twice project size (1440 x 960 in this case)".
Stick to these numbers and you'll fly through the render.
Make sure to render at Best and it'll look fine.

Mike