That would be the subject of other weblog posts. Yes, we can also optimize the animation and make a number of improvements. The resulting animated gif is shown below. I chose to only output the first few seconds of this animation (but it will loop anyway). Next, select File > Save for Web… and make certain the output is set to gif. You should be able to view the animation by clicking on the Play icon. If everything imported successfully, you should see the sequence in the timeline. Make certain you match the frame rate with the rate you used in After Effects (in this case, 10 frames per second). Make certain that you check the box indicating it is an image sequence (and open the first image in the sequence). From the Photoshop menu, select File > Open and point to the location of the image sequence. Now that the sequence of images has been output, it is time to open these images in Photoshop. Once these changes have been made, one should click the Render button to generate the images. A unique number will be applied to each image (recall there are 10 images per second).
The output to… link will now show a name similar to Snowstorm_.png (I chose to place these in a folder called sequence). I numbered these steps in the screen capture below. I clicked on the word lossless and then selected PNG sequence from the selection list and then hit Ok. We next need to specify the type of output. From the menu, select Composition > Add to Render Queue… Once you are satisfied, you need to render the composition. Scrub the playhead in the timeline to verify you have the desired effect (in my case, I was looking to create a snow storm at night as I watched from a window with limited light outside). I created another checkpoint file for those who want to verify they have something similar. Obviously, you can make a lot more changes once your level of comfort with this tool improves. My point is to get you used to working with the tool. Ok, maybe it looks more like a sleet storm than a snowstorm. After tweaking the flakes, size, wind, opacity and a few other values, my animation looked like the following screen capture (this is just one point in the timeline). I modified a few of these to obtain the results I sought. I encourage you to experiment with many of these values to see the changes to the snowfall. Of course, we can make any changes we want to these values. The initial default effects are shown below. With the layer selected, I next chose Effect > Simulation > CC Snowfall from the menu. I created a checkpoint file ( SnowStormStep01.aep) for those who want to start from this point. You should now see something like the screen capture below in After Effects. I named the layer and made certain it fit the entire composition. I selected Layer > New > Solid… from the menu. Now, we need to place the particles (ahem, snow) on something. I went with the default of square pixels (the other choices seem more appropriate for media other than an animated gif. I set the width and height (I also unchecked the “lock aspect ratio” box) and frame rate. You may need to revisit your efforts at some point in the future and you are helping remind yourself what the various objects are in your project. As you can see below, I named the composition (students in my classes know that I recommend always changing the default names to something meaningful). From the menu, select Composition > New composition… You next need to specify the details of your composition. The answer is that you first need a composition. In this case, the smaller image captures my sentiments when I first used this product – ok, now what do I do? Yes, you can always click on the image to enlarge it. As you can see, there are many options, but not a lot of guidance for beginners.
#MAKE GIF IN AFTER EFFECTS SOFTWARE#
The biggest issue people have with any software new to them is where to start. When I launch it, I am presented with the following screen. Ok, let’s get started building a snowstorm… I am using After Effects CC for this project. I recommend readers view that course if they want to learn more than I provide in this tutorial. That course is Web motion for beginners: create a preloader. I also recently reviewed a tutorial on this subject by my colleague and friend Tom Green. I wanted to put together this documentation prior to the next meeting and use it as a starting point for discussion at the meeting. I thought it might be appropriate to create a simple animated gif (perhaps a snowstorm – since we have had so much snow this winter). At our February Web Professionals and Adobe User Group meeting, someone asked about the fundamentals of working with Adobe After Effects.
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