Emma's .GIF tutorial

[Emma 199]

Hi there and welcome! This tutorial is for those who want to learn how to make animated .GIFs. A couple of people have asked me how, so I hope this tutorial is helpful to you in some way. :)

01. Getting your screencaps

Your first step is to get screencaps for your .gif.. either by getting them from a gallery, or making your own. To make my own screencaps, I use KMPlayer (click for download link). All you have to do is open the video, find the part of it you want to cap, right click, and choose Capture > Frame Extract. You can play with the other options, too, such as the size of the caps. Then click play on your video, followed by "Start" in the Frame Extract window. This method makes a TON of caps, though, so you've been warned.

02. Making your GIF

Once you have your caps, find the ones you want to use for your .gif, and open them in Photoshop. Make a new document (with it being the same size as your caps), and start copying and pasting each layer into this document. When you're done copy and pasting, make all the layers but the first one invisible. If you want to add any text or coloring to your gif, do so now.

03. Animating your GIF

Next, go to Window > Animation. Another window should pop up, and this is where all your animation frames go. Right now, you should only see your first layer in this box. At the bottom of every frame, you should see something that says "_______ sec." This is where you change the amount of delay for each frame. The more frames you have, the smaller this number, and the less frames, the bigger this number.

Once you have your amount of delay set to what you like, this is where the .gif actually comes together. In the animation window, click the duplicate button (which looks the same as the standard, by the way). Then, go to the regular layers window, and switch the next layer in line back on, so that it's visible again. Keep working through this process until you have all of your animation layers, and click play in the animation window. If it doesn't look smooth to you, keep changing the amount of delay until it does.

04. Saving your GIF

To save your GIF, simply go to file > Save For Web and Devices. You should see a drop-down menu with various file types. Click that until you see the GIF option, and save. :)

I would love to see results! Ask if you have any questions!

[SebaMonster 0]

THANX! Trying it...

[Homogenic 12]

LUV Ü XOXO

[Nikko 2]

Bookmarking this.

Thank you!

[Giovanni 1]

:heart:

[Visions 2]

yay thanks for this Emma :heart:

[MrFameKills 1,600]

Thanks so much for this

[Echo 326]

Emma do you use that program to make the .gifs?

[vgavorn 0]

Thanks!

[Dr Rogoe 23]

bookmarking yaaas