From Wang Rui, "Just a minor fix of the src/osgDB/CMakeLists.txt, change:

SET(COMPRESSION_LIBRARIES ${ZLIB_LIBRARY})
...
LINK_EXTERNAL(${LIB_NAME} ${OSGDB_PLATFORM_SPECIFIC_LIBRARIES})

to

SET(COMPRESSION_LIBRARIES ZLIB_LIBRARY)
...
LINK_EXTERNAL(${LIB_NAME} ${OSGDB_PLATFORM_SPECIFIC_LIBRARIES}
${COMPRESSION_LIBRARIES})
LINK_WITH_VARIABLES(${LIB_NAME} ${COMPRESSION_LIBRARIES})


I notice that the LINK_EXTERNAL macro won't distinguish between debug
and release dependences, which means that osgDB will use the release
version of zlib for all build configurations. Under Win32, this will
cause a manifest problem: all applications using osgDB may complain
"failed to start because msvcr80.dll was not found" or similar
messages.

This change will make it back to normal."

src/osgDB/CMakeLists.txt

@@ -126,7 +126,7 @@ ENDIF()
 IF( ZLIB_FOUND )
     ADD_DEFINITIONS( -DUSE_ZLIB )
     INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES( ${ZLIB_INCLUDE_DIR} )
-    SET(COMPRESSION_LIBRARIES ${ZLIB_LIBRARY})
+    SET(COMPRESSION_LIBRARIES ZLIB_LIBRARY)
 ENDIF()
 
 ADD_DEFINITIONS(-DOSG_PLUGIN_EXTENSION=${CMAKE_SHARED_MODULE_SUFFIX})
@@ -135,7 +135,8 @@ LINK_INTERNAL(${LIB_NAME}
     osg
     OpenThreads
 )
-LINK_EXTERNAL(${LIB_NAME} ${OSGDB_PLATFORM_SPECIFIC_LIBRARIES} ${COMPRESSION_LIBRARIES})
+LINK_EXTERNAL(${LIB_NAME} ${OSGDB_PLATFORM_SPECIFIC_LIBRARIES})
+LINK_WITH_VARIABLES(${LIB_NAME} ${COMPRESSION_LIBRARIES})
 LINK_CORELIB_DEFAULT(${LIB_NAME})
 
 IF( ZLIB_FOUND )