Stiching is a good idea when you can deal with Zones, but it takes away the realism. If you wish to have people interact, or overlay a bit, you might consider using DownRezer to downsize the textures and lower the RAM requirements of the scene.

Having an actual smaller file size reduces the required computation from the CPU (like computing the new texter files size) when rendering, thus a faster rendering, and less RAM used.

If you use the "DownRezer" poser utility, you might be able to fit twice as much people in your scene. Look for it in the renderosity marketplace. It works great, and you can't even see the difference in textures, once you render.

If you DownRez your textures, you might have more chances of successfully running a complete scene with only 512MB ram. check for the "DownRezer" poser utility in renderosity marketplace.

To solve most unexplained crashes, this is what i do:

1- Start -> Run -> type "msconfig" -> go to "Startup" tab, and uncheck all things you absolutely know that you don't need to startup when your windows starts. In doubt, leave it there (although it can be re-checked if you lack a functionality in some other software). Then, restart and open your software directly (poser, daz, carrara, bryce...) and 50% of the crashes are resolved.

2- Get the DownRezer poser utility (small software available at renderosity), and use it to be able to put more people and clothing in a scene without charging your RAM. Although some people recommend the use of virtual memory, which works fine, it will still slow down your render time. Less RAM used = faster and more stable render, at every level. You shoud DownRez your textures on models too far from the camera to make a difference. 99% of the time, you can't even see the difference in textures unless you move the camera to a model big closeup.

3- Before a serious render, i restart the computer, which now has less stuff that auto-loads, and i do NOTHING else before i render, not even play in the software for adjustments. I do 20 hour renders with complex and polygon heavy files without any problem, now that i lower the system background tasks and DownRez my textures.

Recorded my voice.
Put my voice thru Mimic PRO 3, that generates a lips pose file
Import baby model in Carrara
Import Mimic generated speach pose into the base model
animate and render.

All models from "The Dorkers" project are purchassed here and there (renderosity, daz,...). I do everything else, but the models... are beyond my actual competence.

Well, i guess that i could use a beta tester with poser 4 or 5. Apply if you wish, and i'll consider. I see that there is a demand.

Using the scratch disk will effectively allow more stuff to load up in virtual memory, but will still slow down the workflow and the rendering (hard drive is much slower than live RAM), sometimes dramatically. I use the DownRezer utility to allow more characters, clothings, scene items, while keeping memory usage low. Look for it in the renderosity store, it works great.

Hi guys. I just posted this text in another thread, but is completely relevant to this thread, cause it is exactly aiming at performence: speed, memory usage and prevent crashes. Two things i did to prevent software crashes (On XP) and have faster renderings:

1- Start -> Run -> type "msconfig" -> go to "Startup" tab, and uncheck all things you absolutely know that you don't need to startup when your windows starts. In doubt, leave it there (although it can be re-checked if you lack a functionality in some other software). Then, restart and open your software directly (poser, daz, carrara, bryce...) and 50% of the crashes are resolved.

2- Get the DownRezer poser utility (small software available here at renderosity), and use it to be able to put more people and clothing in a scene without charging your RAM.

Two things i did to prevent software crashes (On XP):

1- Start -> Run -> type "msconfig" -> go to "Startup" tab, and uncheck all things you absolutely know that you don't need to startup when your windows starts. In doubt, leave it there (although it can be re-checked if you lack a functionality in some other software). Then, restart and open your software directly (poser, daz, carrara, bryce...) and 50% of the crashes are resolved.

2- Get the DownRezer poser utility (small software available here at renderosity), and use it to be able to put more people and clothing in a scene without charging your RAM.

To lower the memory usage of my scene and be able to put much more people and clothing, i use DownRezer, that helps manage the size of texture files loaded. You can search Renderosity about it. It works great.

My best purchase is a revolution in Poser / DAZ / Carrara. It allows me to put four times more people and clothing in a single scene. Its the DownRezer utility. If you don't know about it, you must take a look at it.
http://market.renderosity.com/mod/bcs/index.php?ViewProduct=61698