Technique - Animated GIF

Animated GIF

Definition - An animated GIF is an image encoded in graphics interchange format (GIF),which contains a number of images or frames in a single file and is described by its own graphic control extension. The frames are presented in a specific order in order to convey animation. An animated GIF can loop endlessly or stop after a few sequences.

The image below demonstrates this technique.

This technique can be achieved using these steps:

1. A tripod must be used

2. Fast shutter speed

3. Manual camera settings (to fix the exposure)

4. Manual focus - to ensure that the focus doesn't automatically shift to another object in the background

5. No Camera shake (be careful when pressing the button).

6. Direct the shoot (composition/framing and where the moving elements will move from and to are important.

7. Photo-editing software, for example photoshop

Image Bank

 

My Images 

When taking these photos I used a tripod. This is because the only part of the image I wanted to change was the model and by using a tripod I was able to lee the background the exact same. I used a shutter speed of 1/125 and an aperture of 5.6. The relatively fast shutter speed allowed me to freeze motion rather than capture motion. 

How to Edit the Images

1. Open all of the images I want to use in photoshop.

2. Each of the images need to be resized by selecting image, image size and set the dimensions to 72 dpi and 900 x 600 pixels. Also the resample option must be selected.

3. Copy and paste each image in the order I want to use them into the same photoshop file. Each image must be a different layer in the order of the sequence.

4. Select Window then Timeline.

5. Select Create video time line

6. I then dragged the images into the time line and adjusted each clip duration to 5 frames.

7. I then ordered the images in the sequence that I wanted them to appear in the GIF.

8. To test that the GIF was working I pressed the play button. I then pressed 'set the playback options button' and then ensured the looping option was selected. 

9. In order to save the animation I selected file, save for web. 

10. I ensured the gif file option was selected and that the looping was set to forever. 

Evaluation

I feel as though the GIF I created was successful because I was able to make the GIF flow like a sequence of images. 

I think that the GIF may have been more successful if I had asked the model to move in a more interesting way therefore I would like to experiment with this technique in more depth. 

I also feel as though when looking at the camera settings the sky in the photo was slightly over exposed therefore I think I could have altered the settings slightly. 

Progression

I think that I may be able to incorporate this within my future work however I would not focus on people I would look at the movement of nature or a landscape. I think this could be an interesting way of expressing images because it is unlike anything I have ever used before.