Quote:
Originally Posted by _paralyzed_
how do you save and share a .gif properly?
am I even using the correct terminology? I mean those pics that are video like and repeat like every 5 seconds. like a video avatar or whatever.
I came across a killer one. (literally)
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GIF stands for Graphics Interchange Format. They can have a max of 255 colors (either an optimized palette or X number of "slots" for each of the main colors), can be animated or not, and have the ability for a transparent background. Animation is done simply by creating a number of frames (kinda like a flip book), and you set the animation interval and whether to play once or repeat. Background transparency is all or nothing; a pixel is fully transparent or opaque. No partial transparency; you need PNG format with alpha transparency for that.
To create/edit them propery, you need some type of image editing software. I personally like PaintShop Pro with the Animation Shop add-on (the animation shop is what you need to make the mult-frame animation).
And to run down the other common graphics formats:
JPG: Stands for Joint Photographic experts Group. Another common image format. Depending on the software you use to create them, they can be saved with varying quality levels. The lower the quality, the smaller the filesize. No transparency, and no animation.
PNG: Stands for Portable Network Graphics. Much better graphic format IMO. No animation, but compresses very well with minimal loss. The biggest advantage to this type is that you can have partial transparency; especially useful for aliasing rounded edges (reduces the "stair step" effect) and to create realistic shadows.
BMP: Stands for BitMaP. Not compressed at all, so depending on the color depth, the filesize can get very large. But quality is nice.
That enough info for you?
