5.1.2 crashing on renders

I'm rendering out a 10-bit sequence, 54 mins in length. If I set up to render "in to out," and walk away, when I come back FCP has either crashed or gives a thin little notice of "out of memory."

I tried babysitting renders, which I can do for single layer, but if there's two or three layers of compositing in there, FCP begins tabulating, generating up to 70% of the render and then jumps to the "o/o/m" thing again. I've also sat idly by, waiting, watching it get to 60%, then canceling the render, saving what rendered up to that point, then trying again to finsish it out. The problem is, it will never finish, it goes to "o/o/m".

I've tried taking problem areas out and pasting in a new sequence, rendering, same deal. I've started up on the install disc, run utilities, then performed the sudo daily weekly monthly fix and the problem persists. What to do?

OS 10.4.8, QT 7.1.3, FCP 5.1.2, Intel 2x3GHz dual-core, 3GB DDR2 RAM

Please help! Aiuto!

I'm guessing your Scratch Disk is running out of space. Check all drives connected to the system.


www.derekmok.com

No, my scratch disc is open, with more than 300GB.

I've got a G-RAID, FW 800 on this, I tried setting the scratch to the system drive & couldn't really see a difference.

Also have a SATA connected but off (another show). Could it be that b/c it's cabled into the SATA card there's an issue, even with it off?

> Also have a SATA connected but off (another show). Could it be that b/c it's cabled into the
> SATA card there's an issue, even with it off?

I doubt it. Drives that are off rarely have any impact on operations.

What about the system drive? Check all drives connected to your computer, see if any of them is filled up beyond 90 per cent. Also, are you sure nobody mucked with your System Settings - Scratch Disks while you weren't looking?


www.derekmok.com

My system drive is 50% free.

I'm pretty sure nobody's messed with my settings. Originally, I had everything on this show going to the G-RAID, catpures, caches, etc. Dunno. What else could it be? It was doing this on 5.1.1, then I upgraded QT and also to 5.1.2 hoping there'd be a fix in there.

Thanks for your help, Derek.

I've trashed prefs, pasting sequence into new proj... nothing has worked so far.

How much of the show is already rendered? It may be worth it to do one of the following:

1. Use Tools - Render Manager to ditch all render files in case some of them have gone corrupt. Re-render from scratch.

2. Backup your project file. Then take all media offline without deleting the source files (SHIFT-D, Leave All Files on Disk). Reconnect media and see if the behaviour improves.

3. Move your timeline and everything else into a new project file with identical settings.


www.derekmok.com

A lot of the show is rendered. It's really terrible because it's just a few files amounting to about two minutes of an entire 54min show.

Maybe I should try suggestion #2

Take a look at this in the FAQ.

[www.lafcpug.org]

Michael Horton
-------------------

Thanks, Mike, but I can't find anything to address this problem on this page. Did I overlook something?

I tried sending the clip offline, but leaving it on disc, and the result was that when I reconnected, it gave me the "out of memory" warning again. This is really whacked.

Talks about 3rd party quicktime components possibly causing problems.

Out of memory error? Any of your clip names got ileagal characters such a / in them? If so, take them out.

Michael Horton
-------------------

YES! I found that one of the clips, the producer had placed a semicolon in place of an "L". I knew that was problematic, so I renamed the clip, replaced it on the TL, yet I still have the "o/o/m" prob.

The only other 3rd party stuff... I'll check back

Okay, I checked my QT bits at /library/QuickTime and there's only 15 things showing up.

The only foreigners are:
DecktopVideoOut
Flip4Mac WMV Export
Flip4Mac WMV Import

I dragged the Flip4Mac stuff to the desktop, restarted FCP and the same probelm reared it's ugly head. Damn.

Is there anything else?

Thanks, Mike.

Stumped. Tried dumping all renders files and re-rendering?

Michael Horton
-------------------

Man, that seems crazy at this point. Just about everything, I'm talking huge renders are finished, and it's just these last little guys left.

That reluctance to let go of potentially corrupt render files could be part of the problem.

Export everything that has already been rendered into self-contained, full-quality movie files. Then dump those render files and render what's left.


www.derekmok.com

it really sounds like there's a problem with your MEDIA

take a look at the problem areas / clips and see if there;s anything about those clips that stands out, or makes them different from the others.

are they graphics?
maybe they're the wrong colour space?
should be RGB, not CMYL

if they're clips
can you recapture them?


nick

I had this problem on one of the Intel Quads after taking a project from the Dual G5 to render an 8bit Uncompressed version.

I sorry to say I just had to sit there and stop the rendering every few minutes and start it again.

I tried every trick in the book, but after a reinstall of FCP and quicktime plus some general system maintenance the suite has been working fine, although I haven't tried taking a project formerly created on another suite across to see if the problem reoccurs.

There seemed to be a crash problem with Boris Titles so I removed all the titles and rendered them separately after I had got the final untitled 8bit sequence rendered.

Also some plugins are problematic with intel despite working well most of the time I've yet to weedle out exactly which combinations caused the out of memory problems.

My suggestion is to sit with it and render in chunks or select sections of the timeline and render them bit by bit.

This way you should be cool to get it done. You could also try exporting a self-contained movie without rendering first. It should render down as it outputs.

Ben


PS. Sorry I can't be of more help, I dont often get chance to play with the intel machines and test the conflicts properly. Be sure I will post as and when I find the culprit(s)...



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

I have FAQ'd the Out of Memory alert here [www.lafcpug.org]
But I think it's still a bit wobbly. If anyone has anything to add please feel free.

> I have FAQ'd the Out of Memory alert here.
> But I think it's still a bit wobbly

I think as this thread has shown, this issue is just damned elusive, especially for long-distance troubleshooting. We'd probably have more success if we were there at the station itself, but even that's not a guarantee.

unamalatesta, if you want to test out what Ben said (it's a good idea), backup your project file to a secure place, then start removing chunks of your edited sequences. Or, just copy that one problematic section to a brand-new project file, and nothing else.

Oh, one more thing...any oversized effects shots, graphics etc. in your timeline? Isolate the problematic section and look through the settings of every piece.


www.derekmok.com

As we figure this OOM issue out which yes is hard, this FAQ will go a LONG way to solving MOST folks OOM issues. Thanks Jude. GREAT job!

As usual


Michael Horton
-------------------

Ta Mike.

Thanks, guys.

Hey John

Just checking back to see how we are on this issue?

Did you manage to render the remaining clips in bits or did you successfully find the conflict/OOM error?

Lets us know how you got on.


Cheers

Ben



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Hi, Ben.

Thanks for asking (and for all the attempts from everyone to solve this).

Well, I tried opening a new project, pasted in the problematic clips (one a still, the other a 10-bit clip), and the same thing, with the OOM. For my deadline, which was a DVD for preview, I removed those nasty bits and brought-in versions of those same areas from my offline quicktime reference version of the film, to patch holes.

I don't know what it is yet. I'm going to rerender the whole show. If that doesn't work, I will rework the problematic still, and re-dige the screwy clip before I lay off. I was able to limp along, and really appreciated the genuine interest and support.

Thanks, guys, and I will keep checking back. Hopefully I'll post a successful fix before anyone else gets hit too hard by it.

Ciao.

Okay. There appears to have been some illegal color issues with that still. Called up my original file, changed back to RGB (had mistakened acquired an embedded profile from Silverfast). That solved that. Thanks, Derek, Ben, Jude, Nick and Michael.

I cant believe we didnt say that at the top of this thread. First thing one should look for when getting a OOM error. It IS in the FAQ however thanks to Judes good memory.

Michael Horton
-------------------