So I successfully compiled the videographicsitem sample code in Qt 5.0.2 - Windows7 - MinGW as a release...
It works just fine on the system that has Qt 5.0.2 installed on it. However, I packaged it with all the so called dependencies that the application requested. And then tried to run it on an OS without Qt 5.0.2 installed & it doesn't work.
I remembered reading that certain plugins need to be in their own directory from the exe folder...
so I added /imageformats and /mediaservices and then when that didn't work, I put ALL the plugin directories and dll's into the application folder. Still nothing... I went through and got the can't find .dll errors for each .dll (the hardway) after putting in.....

these are the .dll's that are requested:

icudt51.dll
icuin51.dll
icuuc.dll
libgcc_s_dw2-1.dll
libGLESv2.dll
libpcre16-0.dll
libpng15-15.dll
libstdc++-6.dll
libwinpthread-1.dll
Qt5Core.dll
Qt5Gui.dll
Qt5Multimedia.dll
Qt5MultimediaWidgets.dll
Qt5Network.dll
Qt5OpenGL.dll
Qt5Widgets.dll

and then I add the folders:

/imageformats with all non-debug .dll's
/mediaservice with all non-debug .dll's

it is strange to me, because it feels like the compiled release version is somehow using the debug .dll's
but that cannot be, as all requested .dll's were the non-debug versions. So I'm somehow missing a .dll
or a video release application can't be built to be stand alone? Anybody have any idea why I can't get
the application's release build to run with these .dll's present?