Thanks for responding. I believe the flowplayer plugin page has wrong information.
http://www.zenphoto.org/documentation/plugins/_zp-extensions---flowplayer3.php.html
Note on splash images: Flowplayer will try to use the first frame of a movie as a splash image or a videothumb if existing.
I assumed a thumbnail would be generated. As you suggested, I searched around and found the answer.
I found this page that says the plugin does not generate a thumb and gives info on how to use your own image as the thumb:
http://www.zenphoto.org/2009/03/troubleshooting-zenphoto/#19
Zenphoto is not able to generate thumbnails from videos and shows therefore a default replacement image.
On flowplayer's site, I found this:
http://flowplayer.org/tutorials/generating-thumbs.html
Flowplayer can be set so that there is an initial "splash image" in place of the Flash object when the page loads.
It goes on to describe the manual process of how do to generate the thumb (specific example using the first frame of the movie) using ffmpeg.
They don't claim that it tries to use the first frame of a movie, as you've described on the flowplayer plugin page. This may be the source of all the confusion.
Regarding the video not playing, I found info on the flowplayer site that says, "If you want to use your own video file, the preferred way is to place it on an HTTP or FTP server so you don't have to wait for the uploading process. The video can be in any format, including wmv, avi, mov, mpg, mp4 or asf."
My video is in mpg format, encoded with ffmpg. I believe it should be compatible. I'll try to get this working with flowplayer, outside of zenpage to confirm my video is not the problem.
Does the error message I provided in the original post give any clues? Are there any restrictions or php options that my hosting provider might have in place that would cause issues with the player finding the path to my file?
I'd really like to get this working. It seems like a really great plugin and addition to zenphoto.
Thanks!