Hi
@GracieAllen
Thank you for a quite complete description of your system. Hopefully either here or in the Photoshop forums you will get some guidance.
It does seem like a heavy lift yet I would have thought still doable within your system parameters.
It does leave open the possibility of a bug in LR and/or PS that is not releasing memory after it is being used making the problem even worse.
So pursuing the limitation with Adobe as a bug would be a good parallel path to take.
It actually does sound from the symptoms that you are running out of memory though e.g. when you do it from Bridge if passes.
I will assume that the fail occurs when from LR you use the Edit In > Merge to Panorama in Photoshop
If you are taking a different path, just update in another post.
Note that when not taking into account of the overlap between images, your Nikon 850 files horizontall are 8256 pixels wide and with 5 images makes it 41,280 total width.
Height is 5504 pixels making the potential canvas size around 227 Mpixels and in 16 bit mode RGB ~1.3 GB per Layer worst case. PS can be pretty good at not using the transparent areas yet not sure what happens with the Photo Merge process. With 5 Layers in the stack you could be up to 6.8 GB for this one panorama stack and adding the merged Layer on top you would be at 8.2 GB
That is already close to the limit of the extra memory you had at 10 GB.
Then, extra memory is being used for the Content Aware Fill that would chew up some more.
Now if PS was really smart, it would not use the transparent pixels in each Layer as full memory, and release temporary memory along the way (or effectively use virtual memory.
That is why I think there is a bug because if you exceed the 10GB extra memory limit, good software should just use virtual memory and slow down, not just say I am out of memory.
Do not that the Photo Merge operation is an Adobe Script that was made in 2006 and I don't know if that has been updated over time or not. I took a quick look at the code and I did not see anything obvious that would create an issue yet not an expert on memory management from within a script. Other forum members may have some other ideas.
Again, off hand you very well may be just running out of memory.
So I consider this a software bug in not using Virtual Memory very well when doing the PhotoMerge, then that means as you work with Adobe, what are the "workarounds" (not these are all my opinions)
I don't see that you do much different in your system other than I consider it best to allocate memory as the default. Giving too much memory to PS can cause other system issues and slow downs (thought it does not appear you have caused any issues there as of yet)
A system with 64G memory would obviously give you more head room (at a price and not all systems support 64G)
Though not a pleasant thought you can downsize you image by 2X and probably have a pretty complete workaround. Note that at 300 DPI with the dimensions given above, the pixel density would support an image that is 11 1/2 feet wide and 18 inches high. That's even assuming one would view that panorama from 12 inches distance. That many pixels or that resolution per inch may not be needed. I know that's a PITA especially with such a nice camera yet this is a workaround.
Another path that can be taken to help narrow down the issue is to
1) give the same images to someone on a Mac system and see if they have the same issue or not. Offhand I would assume they would see the same issue yet if they don't, that might be a clue that there me be a related OS limitation/issue going on as well
2) Try doing the panorama step by step instead of the full automated approach e.g.
- bring in the images as Layers into Photoshop (similar to using bridge yet LR is left open
- Then use the command Edit > Auto-Align Layers
- Then use the command Edit > Auto - Blend Layers
- Merge down to one Layer
- Then select the transparent areas, increase selection by 3 pixels and then do the Edit > Content Aware Fill
If the above steps give you relief and not run out of memory, then after bringing the images in to Photoshop, the above steps could be done with an Action
The above approaches may give you workarounds to consider and may also help narrow down where running out of memory occurs, or does not occur for additional feedback to Adobe (which may help them fix the software issue of "out of memory"
Hope this helps with a starting point to consider
John Wheeler
ADDED EDIT - Once you successfully made a panorama (even it without the content aware fill), it would be good to know the "Document Size" as reported by PS in the lower left corner of the image with the "Document Size" option selected. This will give some clue to how much memory is being taken
Also, running in 8 bit mode vs 16 bit mode will cut memory use by 1/2 and may be plenty enough for panorama needs.