More From The Doodle Pad

My latest doodles created over the weekend waiting for some client approvals. I always have fund creating these fun little doodles and coloring them in Photoshop. You can view the gradual color progression at http://bit.ly/1c1mZzO 

Creating An Animated Gif

Creating gif animations can be lots of fun. You can sketch any image you wish and animate it. This is one of several steps I go through. I sketch several images for a parrot. I start with several sketches before I make my final selection and scan it. I take my scanned image and bring it into Illustrator or Photoshop. I finalize my parrot sketch and colorize it. I use my final colored version and cut, paste and adjust parts of this image to arrive at a series of images  to create my animation.

All of my images are saved in a folder named "gallery". This folder is placed on my desktop. I open Photoshop and select "new file" from the menu above. A menu appears and I select 300 pixels for width and height with a transparent background. For the sack of viewing convenience I placed a white background behind the image. This creates my workspace for placing my gallery images. This is achieved by selecting "Place" from the Photoshop menu and import all five images separately within the layers menu. I go to the window in Photoshop's menu and scroll down and select "animation". My animation frames bar appears at the bottom. I now have before me my main image, the layers  menu to the right and my animation frames bar on the bottom with frame index box.

When I select my first image in the layers menu an exact image appears in the first frame for my animation frames. I select the second frame and continue until all my respective frames are placed.

If I want to test the speed for my animation I select the play button just below the individual frames. I select the black arrow to increase or reduce the speed for my animation. Once I have finished adjusting the speed I hit the play button to view how it looks. If I am satisfied I select the File from Photoshop's menu and look for "Save for Web and Devices". Another menu appears and I select the preset "gif 128 dithered" and leave the rest of the features as they are and select save. I test the "gif animation" in my favorite browser to view what I have. If I am satisfied with the results I place my gif animation where I intend for viewing. There you have it how I create a "gif animation". You can view the finished animation here: http://www.paulweiner.com/Animations/index.html ,as well as view more gif animations completed at https://indiegamestock.com/details?i=467