How to create GIF animated photo using Photoshop

Easy steps to make GIF file on Photoshop

Creating an animated GIF essentially means ‘stitching’ different images together to create an animation. For the purpose of this tutorial, we will create this animation:

Step 1: Copy all four pictures into a separate folder.
 
Step 2: Import Files into Photoshop

Go to File -> Scripts -> Load Images into Stack

On the next screen, select ‘Folder’ then browse to the folder you just created.

Hit OK. Photoshop will now import all your images into separate layers, like this:

Now that we have all our images loaded into Photoshop, we can set about creating out animation.

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Step 3: Create the Animation

The animation process in Photoshop can be accessed through the ‘Timeline’ window. Open it by going to Window -> Timeline.

A new window pane will pop up at the bottom. There will be a single button in the center of this pane. Click on the dropdown arrow next to this button and select ‘Create Frame Animation’, like this:

You should now see one of the images in in the Timeline window. You’ll also notice a little dropdown menu in the top right corner of the window. Click on it and select “Create New Layer for Each Frame”

Nothing happened, right?

But that’s because we haven’t actually added our images to the animation. To do this, open the same menu again and click on ‘Make Frames From Layers’.

This basically creates a new frame for each of the layers you have in the Layers panel. You’ll notice that your Timeline window now has all four of your images.

You can now reposition and resize individual images so that they fit in the same canvas size (hit CTRL + T). Once you have the right size and position, you can click on the arrow below each image and select the delay between subsequent slides.

For the purpose of this animation, I choose the duration as 0.5 seconds. You can also choose from the preset duration or enter your own by selecting ‘Other..’

You can also select the order of the images by dragging individual slides into different positions.

There’s another dropdown menu below the slides that says ‘Once’. This controls how many times the animation should repeat. Click open this menu and select ‘Forever’ for an endlessly looping animation.

After you’re done, click on the ‘Play’ button on this toolbar to preview your animation.

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Step 4: Saving Your Animation

In this final step, you will save your animation as a GIF. The easiest way to do this is to press CTRL + ALT + SHIFT + S, or go to File -> Save for Web…

In the window that pops up, select ‘GIF’ as the format. There will be a preset menu above this. Choose ‘GIF 128 Dithered’.

Two things to note here:

    128 refers to the amount of colors in the GIF. GIF is a low quality image format. It cannot faithfully reproduce the colors of a JPEG. Its maximum color range is 256 colors, vs 16M for JPEG. Therefore, the higher number you select, the better the quality of the GIF. Be warned though: better quality GIFs are also slower to load. Keep that in mind if you are using large image animations on the web.

    Dithering is a process in GIF processing that reduces banding in gradients. It makes the resultant image appear much better, but also increases file size dramatically. In an image like the one we used above, dithering is essential. For images in a few solid colors, however, it is recommended that you deselect dithering.

Click on ‘Save’ to save the image. Now open it in your web browser – you should see the animation on an endless loop.

This was easy enough – but what if you want to make a GIF from an existing video?

There’s a solution for that as well.