Are you using different video formats in your project file ? PC specs :
OS Windows 10.0 Pro
MB - AS rock Z77 extreme 11
Intel 3770K @ 4.0 Ghz OC
Gskill 32 GB RAM 1800 Mhz
6 TB HDD, SSD bootable
nVidia ASUS GTX 660 Ti
BenQ 22" LCD monitor 1920x1080

The project file opens fine on my PC. It is referencing video clips located on an F: drive, and some bitmaps on an E: drive that you did not inlcude .

Win8 64-bit Pro Retail
Intel i7-4770
16GB DDR3 1600 8-8-8-24
MSI Z87-G45 Motherboard
ASUS GTX 660 Direct CU II OC 2GB GPU
1 TB RAID 1 (mirrored) Drive Array
Several scratch drives for video, TMP, pagefile.

The F:-drive video clips are indeed the ones I am referring to, but I don't know about bitmaps. Does anybody know how I can alter the file so that I can open it? I've got the video files - Deel1.mpg and Deel2.mpg - on my F:-drive.

Quote: The F:-drive video clips are indeed the ones I am referring to, but I don't know about bitmaps. Does anybody know how I can alter the file so that I can open it? I've got the video files - Deel1.mpg and Deel2.mpg - on my F:-drive.

Well, the project.PDS file is just a text file which can be edited. However, you shouldn't have to. When I open projects and some files used previously are missing, it just asks me if I want to ignore the errors. Something else must be wrong, in your case.

Do the MPG files play properly outside of powerdirector? You can play them with windows media player, for example? Win8 64-bit Pro Retail
Intel i7-4770
16GB DDR3 1600 8-8-8-24
MSI Z87-G45 Motherboard
ASUS GTX 660 Direct CU II OC 2GB GPU
1 TB RAID 1 (mirrored) Drive Array
Several scratch drives for video, TMP, pagefile.

All of them play fine. I tried removing the three mpg-files (Deel1, Deel2 and Deel3 respectively), and it asked me to ignore it. It did, but then crashed few seconds later. I'm betting that it's something with the bmps.

Quote: All of them play fine. I tried removing the three mpg-files (Deel1, Deel2 and Deel3 respectively), and it asked me to ignore it. It did, but then crashed few seconds later. I'm betting that it's something with the bmps.

Seems logical. Is the E drive that the bitmaps are on a local drive or network/USB drive?

Win8 64-bit Pro Retail
Intel i7-4770
16GB DDR3 1600 8-8-8-24
MSI Z87-G45 Motherboard
ASUS GTX 660 Direct CU II OC 2GB GPU
1 TB RAID 1 (mirrored) Drive Array
Several scratch drives for video, TMP, pagefile.

That's my local drive.

Can you try to rename/move the bitmaps temporarily to see if you can get the project to open without them? It will get the missing file error that you can ignore... Win8 64-bit Pro Retail
Intel i7-4770
16GB DDR3 1600 8-8-8-24
MSI Z87-G45 Motherboard
ASUS GTX 660 Direct CU II OC 2GB GPU
1 TB RAID 1 (mirrored) Drive Array
Several scratch drives for video, TMP, pagefile.

I would, but I'm not too sure what bitmaps you're talking about. I can't remember adding bitmaps...

Could you give me the file names?

Anyway, I'm going home now (I'm at my fathers house at the moment, which is where the project is), so I'll try any suggestions tomorrow or in two days.

Thanks a lot, OnTheWeb!

Wouldn't open when I renamed all files in the project, nor when I tried to open it on another computer. I'm pretty sure that it's something that it tries to load after it has loaded all the video files, audio files and pictures. Any ideas?

Hi Vivid,

Can you load PD with other projects or is this the only project with a problem?

Which version of PD7 have you got? (Chair>help>about)

The latest version is 2429a. but some users have reverted back to
2416 or 2227c because of specific problems.

If it happens with other projects, the general solution is to uninstall and reinstall.

If it only this project it may be a difficult one to sort.

Your project file opens fine on my PC but obviously without content other than titles and transitions. It plays OK.

The .bmp file is
SRC="E:\Documents and Settings\User\My Documents\Snapshot(3).bmp" NAME="Snapshot(3).bmp" MUTE="FALSE"

It seems to appear only once in the .pds file.

I note that you have 3 small clips of less than 2 secs @08:11 - sometimes small clips may cause a problem.

The other common source is audio tracks.

In general terms I think you have 2 basic choices :-

Rebuild the project from scratch
or
Get the raw assets together in a local disc location and (without necessarily making a project) add them in one at a time and see if any cause an issue.

If they do, then remove them and let PD open the project ignoring the request for them and re-editing or substituting as necessary.

At your own risk:
the way PD works is to hold all the project info in a .pds file that can be read and edited in, say, notepad - however, get it wrong and PD cannot allow for any wrong edits.

All file references in the .pds file are actual, not relative - so an original file on E: drive, moved to C: drive will not be reflected in the .pds file. Same with renaming etc.

Looking at the .pds file will allow you to identify the assets used if you have no other record. It's very tedious.

Also although PD does produce backup files , which can be renamed as .pds and opened by PD, it is crucial to save backups sequentially so that you can roll back your project to an earlier state and maybe then open an earlier version when a problem arises in the last version.

I'm not sure how much more help is available for this sort of problem.

Cheers
Adrian





Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated. (see below)
Confucius
AMD Phenom IIX6 1055T, win10, 5 internal drives, 7 usb drives, struggling power supply.

Vivid,

Here is a video of what we see when we open your project file. Don't know if it will help, but maybe looking at it tell you something helpful.

YouTube LINK:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kAcDITI-to0 Win8 64-bit Pro Retail
Intel i7-4770
16GB DDR3 1600 8-8-8-24
MSI Z87-G45 Motherboard
ASUS GTX 660 Direct CU II OC 2GB GPU
1 TB RAID 1 (mirrored) Drive Array
Several scratch drives for video, TMP, pagefile.

Thanks for the help guys. I didn't manage to recover my project. It's not a problem in any of the files - audio, video or image - as I removed all of those with Notepad but the error remained. The problem might me in the short clips that vn800rider mentioned. Could somebody remove those clips and then upload the file? I can't seem to find them in notepad.

OnTheWeb, thanks a lot for the video. I now know to search beyond the files, because I saw the same as you do, but at my PC it crashes after all the files load.

The backup file might be my last resort, but it's on a different computer than the one I'm on right now. I didn't know how to use it before, so thanks for the explanation.

Backup didn't load either, so I'm just going to start overnew and make lots of backups. Thanks anyways, guys, much appreciated.

Hi Vivid,

In case you haven't seen this tutorial

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZuK7Fhawaf4

if you have a complex or difficult project it can be useful to split the project into smaller ones and then compile them together as a final finished one.

Hope you win.
Cheers
Adrian


Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated. (see below)
Confucius
AMD Phenom IIX6 1055T, win10, 5 internal drives, 7 usb drives, struggling power supply.