spatz: Joan Watson clutching her head in exasperation (Elementary Joan headache)
spatz ([personal profile] spatz) wrote2013-09-18 10:27 pm

Ten in Ten: Day 2

So, to give myself a break from all the fic I've been writing, I decided for Day 2 to teach myself how to make GIFs...with middling success. I understand most people use Photoshop, but I don't have it and don't want to pirate it, so on the recommendation of Gizmo Freeware Reviews, I tried GifApp. It's a nice simple program, but not ideal for fannish purposes.


The hilarious out-of-screen tackle that Reese makes in 1x12 Legacy:
andrea edit

I did end up with a GIF that works and does what I want it to -- even tried my hand at some dramatic slo-mo--

andrea slow v3

--and I liked that the program could GIF straight from a video source. However, it had a number of problems.
1) no way to add text
2) no way to control file size, and therefore ability to upload to Tumblr (<1MB for gifs)
3) you can control the relative dimensions of the image, but not actually resize the image (ditto Tumblr: <500 pixels wide)
4) you can't save a project, exit, then restart work. All the work has to be done in a single session. Hmph.

*sigh* Anyway, I'll have to try again with a different program. Maybe this method, though it sounds needlessly complicated.

Any of ya'll have recommendations regarding freeware or tutorials for this? There's about a million out there, and I'd love to hear from someone with actual experience.

ETA: now [livejournal.com profile] inmyriadbits tells me she has Photoshop Elements. Thanks, Linds. :P