Introduction: Animated GIF With Mac & Photoshop 5

Materials needed:

  • Mac Computer
  • Photoshop CS5
  • Internet Access
  • Basic Mac Literacy

Step 1: Gathering Photos

  1. Gather how ever many images you want from the Internet.
  2. To download a picture on Mac, click on the image while holding control. Then scroll down to "Save Image As".
  3. A Dialogue box will appear for you to create the name of your image as well as the folder to store your image when it is saved, typically this will be the downloads folder (Click blue save button in bottom right hand corner to complete action).
  4. Repeat process for as many images you would like to include in your GIF.
  5. Optionally, you may use THISfolder of screencaps to use as practice. (Requires program to unzip files, such as WinRar)
  6. Create a New Folder and drag all the images into that folder.

Step 2: Photoshop Process

  1. Find the photoshop file which should be located in the applications folder
  2. Go to File > Scripts > Load Multiple DICOM Files. Find and select the folder you saved your images to and click Ok.

  3. Another way to load files is File > Scripts > Load Files into Stack. Click Browse and find the folder you used saved your images to. Select every file. Click Open. Make sure “Attempt to Automatically Align Source Images” is checked.

  4. Click Ok.

  5. Wait for all of your images to load.

Step 3: Photoshop Process Cont'd

  1. Once all of your images are loaded onto Photoshop, you will see that your pictures are loaded onto the frames section on the right hand side of Photoshop.
  2. These files won't be visible in your animation timeline yet. If you do not have an animation timeline, go to Window > Animation in order to see it.
  3. Once you have an animation widow, go to the three lines and triangle on the upper right hand corner of your timeline. Click "Make Frames From Layers." This will load your frames into the animation timeline.
  4. Crop your image using the crop tool. Your toolbox will be on the left hand side of Photoshop. The crop tools is a black box with a diagonal line through it.
  5. You can make it any dimension that you want. For this tutorial, we are using 245 width and 140 height. Hit Enter and your image will crop.
  6. To resize your image, go to Image > Image Size. Make sure that the dimensions under pixel dimensions match the numbers you used for cropping. Leave document size alone. Make sure the last option is selected as "Bicubic (best for smooth gradients)".

Step 4: Sharpening Your Gif

  1. To sharpen your gif, click the animation button on the bottom right hand of the animation timeline.
  2. Go to the three lines and triangle shape on the frames section (which also looks like three lines and a triangle) and select "Convert to Smart Object"
  3. Go to Filter > Sharpen > Smart Sharpen. Amount should be 500% and .3 radius. Select "Remove Gaussian Blur" and make sure "more accurate" is checked.
  4. Click Ok.

Step 5: Process Part 2 (Timing)

  1. If you click play on your timeline, you'll notice that the gif is incredible fast. To change the time for you gif, continue on.
  2. Click the three lines on the animation bar and select "Flatten Frames into layers"
  3. Then, on your animation bar, turn your animation into frames by clicking the little button on the bottom left.
  4. A warning box may appear. Click continue.
  5. Using the three lines on the animation bar, select "Make Frames From Layers" and your frames will appear again.
  6. Delete the first frame.
  7. Again, using the three lines on the animation bar, click "Select all".
  8. Using any of the frames, click the triangle next to 0 sec. Change this to anything that you want. Typically, anything between .05 and .1 are okay.

Step 6: Saving Your GIF

  1. Go to File > Save For Web and Devices so that a dialogue will appear
  2. Make sure it is saved as a GIF (everything will be on your right hand side for saving changes)
  3. Make sure the "selective" button is selected as well as "pattern" (right underneath)
  4. Make sure that Looping Options set to forever.
  5. Leave everything else as is.
  6. Click Save.
  7. Name your GIF whatever you'd like.