How to make a GIF in Photoshop (for your perfect demo)

Whether you’re selling chocolate chip cookies or access to an API, we all know the importance of showing, rather than telling when promoting a product. For chocolate chip cookies, you offer a free sample. However, how do you show the power of an API or piece of technology?

My answer (as a marketer for a tech company who has been presented with this challenge): craft the perfect GIF.

Here’s why:

• You can add your GIF to pretty much any presentation. Need to show a demo, but don’t want to leave your slide deck, a GIF works perfectly.
• Embedding a GIF into a blog post. Rather than scrolling through an endless stream of screenshots outlining each step of a product, insert a GIF.
• GIFs are way smaller file sizes than a video, and you can alter the settings to make it even smaller a file size than those websites that do build the GIF for you.

What you need:

• Adobe Photoshop
• QuickTime (or something to record your screen)
• A sweet product to show off (we used it for Dwolla FiSync)

The Instructions:

1. Prep

Before you dig into creating your demo GIF, spend time mapping out your screen recording. If this GIF is serving the purpose of demonstrating a function of your technology, you want it to go smoothly; the best way to ensure this is to outline a plan.

2. Record

To record the video that will be turned into a GIF I use QuickTime, which comes standard on most computers. Open QuickTime, go to the top left-hand corner, select ‘File’, then ‘New Screen Recording’.

When beginning your screen recording, hit the record button and drag your cursor to record the part of the screen you want to include in the demo.

3. Import into Photoshop

Start by opening Photoshop, and selecting ‘Window’. From there make sure ‘Timeline’ is selected. This will allow you to edit GIF settings in future steps.

Next, import your video by selecting ‘File’ > ‘Import’ > ‘Video Frames to Layers’.

4. Set your parameters for the GIF

After you have selected to import the video, you will be able to set parameters for the GIF. There are two primary things to tinker with here.

First is the start time. Adjust on the video timeline where you would like the GIF to start using the small, dark half pointer. Likewise, adjust where you would the the GIF to end using the other small pointer. Note: the larger pointer allows you to view your video at different points, but does not actually adjust the timing of your GIF.

You can also adjust the number of frames imported. In Photoshop you are limited to 500 frames to create your GIF, so if the video you’re importing is fairly long (more than a minute), you’ll want to adjust the frame count. When I’m uploading, I usually choose to limit to every 15 frames.

Adjusting frame count essentially means you’re taking out moments of the video. The higher the frame count, the smoother the GIF. If you want a GIF that’s jumpy, bump your frame count up.

You can play around with this, but you’ll have to start over the upload each time you want to try a new frame count.

5. Perfect the timing of your GIF

Once you’ve imported your video, Photoshop will look something like this:

Now is where you fine-tune your GIF. The general lay of the land:

• In the lower left corner of Photoshop are your play and pause buttons. These allow you to test out how your GIF will flow before exporting.
• There is also a down arrow that controls your GIF loop. If you want the GIF to play continuously (like most GIFs) select ‘Forever’

On the timeline across the bottom, you’ll notice an icon for each of your frames. You can delete frames and control the length of time you spend viewing each frame. For instance, if I wanted one frame to get more attention and remain on the screen longer, I would set it to have a longer time. You can alter this timing as much as you would like. If you want to breeze by a certain section, set the timing on all the frames in that section to a shorter length.

Note: If you want to quickly adjust all the frame times in your project, go to the icon made up of an arrow and four, small horizontal lines on the top right-hand side of your timeline and click. In this list of options, choose ‘Select all Frames’. Then you can adjust the time on all the frames with just a few clicks.

6. Saving your gif for use

The final step of creating a gif is saving it properly. Go to ‘File’ then select ‘Save for Web’.

From here, a box will pop up. Here you can:

• View the size of the file
• Alter the number of colors in the GIF to reduce the file size
• Change the image size
• Play around with dithering, etc.

Once you’ve gotten the GIF perfected, you just hit save and you’re good to go! Now you can use your GIF in slide decks, blog posts, or tweets to easily show just how powerful your product is.

Tips:

Is your file size too big? If yes…
Try altering the number of frames in your project. The fewer the frames, the smaller the file. Also try reducing the number of colors or image size you set in the ‘Save for Web’ box.

Does your GIF track too fast? If yes…
Go back to your timeline, select all frames. Click ‘Other’ instead of the preset times provided. Here you can add a few milliseconds to your delay time.

Do you need to cut out a section? If yes…
Select the multiple frames you no longer wish to include then go to the menu button in the top right of the timeline. Here select ‘Delete Frames’ and that section will be removed.

Do you need to ADD a section from another video? If yes…
If you want to splice two videos together and make a GIF, import both videos as explained above. Then, select the section of one video, in the menu on the right of your timeline click ‘Copy Frame’. Next move into your other project, click the frame you would like to import next to and click ‘Paste Frame…’ in the menu.

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Read the original post on blog.dwolla.com