Guide to GIFs

[blueheart]

I notice people seem to make a lot of GIFs around here, at least to me. Their also pretty clear cut, good quality.

They seem like such cool things to me. I've had a lot of ideas for awhile...

But.....I'm a noob, so I don't know where to start. I'm not sure what program to use, or even how to use the editing tools right on the few I have tried.

What program or software do use personally for your creative media? How long have you been making them for? Also, where do you find your media or clips for said GIFs? Because I'm sure Youtube doesn't have everything, or does it, you think?

Also, I'm curious. What was your first GIF? Feel free to post it.

 

[CaptainMarvelQ8]

People don't create them here,they just post them from another site.
But in general,the process is not that hard once you have the right tools.i used to do them once using Photoshop and Virtual dub but that was a long time ago.Search for tutorials

 

[Lancelot]

Any .gifs I work with, I use GIMP for. At least that allows for frame-by-frame editing where necessary. A lot of people just use gifsoup.com, I think it is, to crop one from a video clip. Most of them I find on 4chan or other boards like Zero-chan, or just by searching "[insert item] .gif"

 

[blueheart]

Isn't GIMP just for single picture editing though? I mean one where I could incorporate videos and edit them. But not end up making another video, just use that edited clip as a GIF. Or is that not how it works?

 

[Orion]

Isn't GIMP just for single picture editing though?

Nah, it treats each layer of an image as a frame, and when you make it into a gif, after each interval a layer is removed, making the image animated.

I mean one where I could incorporate videos and edit them. But not end up making another video, just use that edited clip as a GIF. Or is that not how it works?

That's what separate programs can do, or you can go into a video and save individual frames as images.

 

[Lancelot]

I just do that stuff the hard way and screenshot each frame then make it into a .gif

 

[Hero]

i'll dream of you

Go nuts. It sucks that Photoshop only accepts few formats. Hell, it won't even accept half of the .avi files I have.

I get mine from tumblr. It's amazing for gifs.

 

[blueheart]

^That's a good tutorial, but I'm confused. What program are you using?

Do you use GIMP for that, or Photoshop, or a video editing software?


I'm not trying to be difficult. I just don't understand. Don't you need a program or editing software to make a GIF?

 

[Hero]

I use Photoshop, but it only accepts certain file formats.

 

[blueheart]

Is it better than GIMP, for making GIFs with videos? GIMP won't accept videos for me.

 

[Hero]

Is it better than GIMP, for making GIFs with videos? GIMP won't accept videos for me.

Photoshop will accept videos with the following formats: .mov, .avi, .mpeg, .mpg, .mp4.

It's really picky though. I'm able to make gifs of the 6th One Piece movie, but not ones from the 8th movie and both are in .avi.

 

[blueheart]

Doesn't Photoshop cost money? I can't pay that, unless there a free download somewhere.

 

[Hero]

I can't help you there. I don't think we're talk about anything "illegal" on the forums. Look around online, that's all I'm going to say.

 

[Orion]

Photoshop can be illegally pirated for free, or you can get GIMP, which is totally free and totally legal and pretty much does everything that Photoshop can do, including making gifs.

 

[Oberon]

I make gif's rather rarely. But if I do make them, I import an .mp4 video file into photoshop (cs5) and edit it from there. It's pretty easy to do and it looks nice as long as the video quality is good to begin with.

 

[metrifyx]

It's pretty easy to make GIFs with GIMP if you have GAP (GIMP Animation Package). Both are free, but not quite as good as Photoshop. For example, if you wanted to add text to it, it would be a lot more annoying to do in GIMP. I can make a tutorial for you, if you want.

 

[Silh]

Here's something I used.



I do it slightly differently now though. Tons more work, but the quality is better.

 

[Hero]

Here's something I used.



I do it slightly differently now though. Tons more work, but the quality is better.

Words can not express how much I love you. Now I can actually use episodes for gifs. This doesn't let you add text though, right?

 

[metrifyx]

Thanks for sharing, Silh! That way seems a lot better than the way I was doing it. I'll have to try it out.

 

[Hero]

While await said guide, is there a limit to how many frames a gif can have before Photoshop crashes?

I made a gif using the programs you've listed and added a watermark using photoshop but it crashed as soon as I tried saving it. This one had around 500 frames, and a gif that I made earlier had about 150-200 frames before photoshop crashed.