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[GraveHorizon]

Is anyone else having trouble with Avidemux 2.5? It just recently stopped working. It'll open and allow me to select a file, but when it tries to load the video, it displays this:

Obviously Windows never tells me why it happened, so I have no clue what's up. The next time I start it up it says there's a crash file and asks if I want to load it, saying it will delete it if I don't. Clicking yes leads to another crash, and clicking no just starts the process all over again. There's also that B-frame reference warning when choosing to open an MP4, but that makes no difference just like any other file. Reinstalling didn't help either. Is Avidemux on some sort of time limit?

I used avidemux, but every time I went to save the video as a jpeg, it was just output this single tiny file with no filetype extension. I was able to just go through frame by frame luckily since it was a short animation but I'd imagine it would suck on longer ones. Regardless, the fruit of my efforts:

Are you choosing "Save Selection as JPEG Images"? And when you do, are the frames you want to keep highlighted with the A to B function? Saving one frame at a time sounds like you either aren't selecting more than one frame, or you're saving as just a JPEG.

EDIT: Fixed the problem with Avidemux. I went in the Video tab of Preferences, and switched Video Display from Qt to QT (OpenGL). Files started being loaded, but only the audio ran right when playing. The video just flickered between solid colors, and only displayed when paused or manually changing frames. Switched the Video Display back, and now it works like before. Still no idea what happened.

 

[strobogo]

I'm having the same problem where it won't even allow me to save something as a series of images. It only offers save as a JPEG or BMP.

 

[See You Next Wednesday]

Has no one mentioned VirtualDub as a fast easier way to make gifs?
Just set the bar at which you want to make a gif out of a video & then save as gif.
You can resize & crop the clip as well in VirtualDub.

Way easier than going through all the hupla with several programs & whatnot.

 

[GraveHorizon]

Is there an easy way to add decent text to GIFs? Text in Jasc looks so shitty, either because of the intrusive effects or the borderless letters which render everything unreadable unless the color of the text perfectly contrasts with a mostly uniform background color. I hope there's some option I just missed.

Has no one mentioned VirtualDub as a fast easier way to make gifs?
Just set the bar at which you want to make a gif out of a video & then save as gif.
You can resize & crop the clip as well in VirtualDub.

Way easier than going through all the hupla with several programs & whatnot.

Every time I use VirtualDub, it takes super long to do anything, and acts like it's doing much more work than whatever I'm doing requires.

 

[The Faceless Master]

Has no one mentioned VirtualDub as a fast easier way to make gifs?
Just set the bar at which you want to make a gif out of a video & then save as gif.
You can resize & crop the clip as well in VirtualDub.

Way easier than going through all the hupla with several programs & whatnot.

i do all the clipping and resizing in VirtualDub, then export as BMP and do all of the fine tuning for color palette and other optimizations in Animation Shop.

 

[Nemesis_]

How do you fine tune colour palette in Jasc?

I'm trying to strike a good divide between these two GIFS. The first is captured with AviDemux and the second is captured with VirtualDub. As you can see, there is an obvious difference.

I want something in between. The more colourful one is too dark / saturated but the top one is too washed out.

I mean I could manually edit them in Photoshop but it makes it so long for one GIF. ;_;

 

[BGBW]

If you have Photoshop couldn't you just make the gif in that and make an adjustment layer that applies to all the layers?

 

[A Sentient Keyboard]

What is the maximum size a gif can be for it to be 'usable' on the internet? After a lot of culling, cropping, resizing and optimizing I got a 618 frame, 854x480 down to about 15mb. Is that still way too much, is it about right or can it be much more than that?

Thanks for the tutorial, by the way, it's been a great help!

 

[AuthenticM]

I'm using the latest Avidemux (2.6.1). I can successfully crop the part of the video that I want to export as .jpg by editing, but when I do save them as .jpg (or even .png), the software creates a "file" of varying size depending on its content. The file does not have an extension; it's a "file". When I try selecting it in Jasc, it doesn't work.

 

[A Sentient Keyboard]

Sweet, I can make gifs now:

I'm using the latest Avidemux (2.6.1). I can successfully crop the part of the video that I want to export as .jpg by editing, but when I do save them as .jpg (or even .png), the software creates a "file" of varying size depending on its content. The file does not have an extension; it's a "file". When I try selecting it in Jasc, it doesn't work.

I ran into the same thing. As it turns out, Avidemux 2.6 doesn't have the 'save as multiple jpegs' option anymore. Just download 2.5 and you're good to go.

 

[AuthenticM]

I ran into the same thing. As it turns out, Avidemux 2.6 doesn't have the 'save as multiple jpegs' option anymore. Just download 2.5 and you're good to go.

That's weird. Why would they remove this function ? I'll try 2.5 then.

 

[A Sentient Keyboard]

That's weird. Why would they remove this function ? I'll try 2.5 then.

Most (single) frame editing is not present in 2.6: 2.6 is time based an not frame based.

But yeah, it's weird. Maybe it should be in the OP.

 

[AuthenticM]

I just tried 2.5.6-1. Moving through the video fucks up the order of frames. :/

After years of trying to make a gif, it feels as if the universe just doesn't want me to succeed...

 

[A Sentient Keyboard]

I just tried 2.5.6-1. Moving through the video fucks up the order of frames. :/

After years of trying to make a gif, it feels as if the universe just doesn't want me to succeed...

Really? I didn't have that issue.

When I open a video (in 2.5.6, not 2.5.6-1, though I don't think it matters), it asks if I want to change something about the frames, and I say 'no'. Maybe that's your problem?

 

[See You Next Wednesday]

What is the maximum size a gif can be for it to be 'usable' on the internet? After a lot of culling, cropping, resizing and optimizing I got a 618 frame, 854x480 down to about 15mb. Is that still way too much, is it about right or can it be much more than that?

Thanks for the tutorial, by the way, it's been a great help!

Anyone know if you can do this in VirtualDub as well?
Does the compression option work in reducing gif sizes aside of video files?

I want to make a larger & slightly longer sized version of this

 

[AuthenticM]

Where do you download the software ? I grab it from here. Do you get the 32 bit version or 64 bit ? I tried the 64 bit versions.

 

[A Sentient Keyboard]

Where do you download the software ? I grab it from here. Do you get the 32 bit version or 64 bit ? I tried the 64 bit versions.

I got it from there, but the 32bit version, because my computer runs on 32bit Windows XP.

 

[AuthenticM]

BOOM

I had to use the 32-bit executable of version 2.5.6-1 for it to work properly. Thank you Neogaf.

edit: here's another one

 

[GraveHorizon]

Anyone else notice Jasc GIFs being just a little too fast or too slow? Mine always are, but I choose smooth framerate over choppy better-timed GIFs.

BOOM

I had to use the 32-bit executable of version 2.5.6-1 for it to work properly. Thank you Neogaf.

edit: here's another one

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAr_TQ3nPMU

 

[AuthenticM]

Is it possible to save the unoptimized animation ? Even the "best quality" setting reduces the quality. I can't find an option to save the raw animation.

 

[Broder Salsa]

Is it possible to save the unoptimized animation ? Even the "best quality" setting reduces the quality. I can't find an option to save the raw animation.

It's a GIF file, you can only do so much with 256 colors.

 

[alr1ght]

You can save it as an uncompressed avi.

save as>avi>uncompressed

 

[AuthenticM]

Ok, thanks.

Another question: how do I appose a watermark on my gifs ? I'd like to put my name in a small font in the lower right corner of the image.

 

[Linius]

Ok, thanks.

Another question: how do I appose a watermark on my gifs ? I'd like to put my name in a small font in the lower right corner of the image.

There's the 'apply text effect' function in Jasc to do stuff like that with.

Something like this is what you want right?

 

[AuthenticM]

There's the 'apply text effect' function in Jasc to do stuff like that with.

Something like this is what you want right?

Yeah ! Something like this. I tried both "insert text effect" and "apply text effect", but couldn't figure out how they worked. Also, it seemed like I had to add some special effect to the text such as bouncing and highlight and whatnot.

How did you do what you did with my gif ? Could you write some sort of step-by-step guide, if it's not too much asking ?

 

[Linius]

1. Open the .gif in Jasc
2. Select all frames (or just the ones you want when applying text to certain frames)
3. Right click and go to 'apply text effect'
4. Type the text you want to apply in the white box
5. Click 'font' to adjust the size etc
6. Select 'custom color' in the top right to pick a color for your text
7. Then go to 'customize'. You'll see a black box which represents the gif and a white box within it representing the text you're adding. Move the white box to where you want the text to be in the gif and click ok when you're done
8. Save gif!

I hope this will do.

Made another variation while writing this down, adjusted the speed a little. Moves more natural now imo.

 

[alr1ght]

don't become a watermarker. :|

 

[BGBW]

Anyone know if you can do this in VirtualDub as well?
Does the compression option work in reducing gif sizes aside of video files?

I want to make a larger & slightly longer sized version of this
http://i.minus.com/i9Khqj5fqiO1j.gif

Well for that you could make sure the first frame has a black background and then erase it from all the other frames with the magic wand tool and then choose the option to not dispose frames. This will basically carry the black from the first frame over to the other frames. You may need to touch up a bit to make sure each frame draws over parts of the previous frame that you don't want i.e. a head moving from side to side.

don't become a watermarker. :|

Yep. Gifs should be a gift to the web.

 

[Linius]

don't become a watermarker. :|

I may have created a monster

 

[AuthenticM]

Alright, I think I got it. I have two more questions though:

1. in the "customize" options menu for the "backlight" effect, if I set all the light effect values to "0", will this turn it off completely, or do I have to go through some other means to apply the text without any graphical effect ?

2. When I open a gif with Jasc and apply some modifications to it, such as adding a watermark, is there some way to avoid re-optimizing the file ? I don't want to degrade the quality even further, which it seems to have done.

note: don't worry, I'm not going to watermark all of my gifs; only those I might create in the future which would take super long to make, such as the Kaz gifs.

 

[Wiseblade]

Ok, thanks.

Another question: how do I appose a watermark on my gifs ? I'd like to put my name in a small font in the lower right corner of the image.

Don't. Watermarking GIFs is poor form.

 

[GraveHorizon]

Don't. Watermarking GIFs is poor form.

Yeah, don't be that asshole. Unless it's personal content, in which case lock it down.

 

[AuthenticM]

Back for another round of questions.

1. From the first three images, which has the most optimal size for common usage on the Internet ? After seeing the biggest, x360 image, I figure it's surely not that one, but since I uploaded it on minus, I figured I might as well post it here anyway.

2. Is there some way to get a gif to have the exact same framerate as its original video ? In this case, the gifs are from the show Community, which was filmed at 30 frames per second. In Jasc, this would translate in each frame being displayed for 3.333... centiseconds. However, Jasc does not permit decimals; only whole numbers. The first x180 gif has its frames set at 3 centiseconds, while the second x180 gif (the last one) has its frames set at 4 centiseconds. Neither runs at the video's native framerate. The 3 centiseconds gifs runs too fast, while the 4 centiseconds one runs too slowly.

edit: I've turned into links two of the gifs because it hampered the browser. Here:

http://i.minus.com/ibq9sgYJGIykXo.gif
http://i.minus.com/ibiKJOu2JK7WkK.gif

 

[wwlnd]

2. Is there some way to get a gif to have the exact same framerate as its original video ? In this case, the gifs are from the show Community, which was filmed at 30 frames per second. In Jasc, this would translate in each frame being displayed for 3.333... centiseconds. However, Jasc does not permit decimals; only whole numbers. The first x180 gif has its frames set at 3 centiseconds, while the second x180 gif (the last one) has its frames set at 4 centiseconds. Neither runs at the video's native framerate. The 3 centiseconds gifs runs too fast, while the 4 centiseconds one runs too slowly.

there's more: chrome and firefox don't render gifs at the same speed.

 

[AuthenticM]

Jesus Christ. Is there some easy way to make a gif perfectly faithful to its source ? Here's another one that I've made.

I asked myself: "at what number should the fps be to be able to have a frame last for the lowest round number in a gif, with a maximum number of frames per second ?" With simple mathematics, I found that for a 30fps video, I could reduce it to 25fps with each frames lasting 4 centiseconds in the gif. In theory, this should have the gif be at the same speed and length as its source video. But it doesn't seem to be the case. I compared the gif with the video running on vlc, and the gif seem to be slightly faster.

Is there some gif master who could help ?

edit: weird, because this gif is slower than the first gif of my previous post, but faster than the second, which would make it closer to the source video.

 

[wwlnd]

Jesus Christ. Is there some easy way to make a gif perfectly faithful to its source ? Here's another one that I've made.

i don't think so, and especially not if you're targeting both browsers.

one final thing you could try is adding motion blur (w/ e.g. avisynth - mvtools).

for 24fps vids you could try this to change the fps to 30. it uses motion interpolation and works pretty well imo. an example.

btw, on my system a gif is slightly faster in firefox when viewing it alone than when it's embedded in a regular page.

 

[AuthenticM]

Thanks. I'll check it out later.

All of this nonsense if pushing me towards the opinion that the .gif format needs to be replaced. There has to be some other, newer format, no ? Gifs are so popular on the Internet that one might think that somebody somewhere would have taken it in his own hands to build a format which would allow better image quality at better sizes and just more customization all-around.

 

[A Sentient Keyboard]

Which browser displays gifs the slowest?

 

[AuthenticM]

I'll add to that: why would there even be differences in the display of gifs from browser to browser ? Is .gif such a dated and broken format ?

 

[Wario64]

I need a better program for more serious, larger GIFs. JASC gives memory problems on larger GIFs

 

[Mesoian]

Just made this using premiere's animated gif function. Seems pretty good. Aspect ratio is messed up though and the settings seem rigid. I'll try some more.

 

[Cse]

Step 3. File>Save>Save Selection as JPEG Images...(name the resulting file whatever you like). (Note: avidemux seems to mess up the colorspace of the outputted images, so beware. Hopefully they fix it.)

Having trouble with this step - in Avidemux, there is no "save selection as JPG images" option.

I can either save the video, or save a single frame, but there doesn't seem to be an option for saving the edited clip as a collection of images...

 

[magawolaz]

Step 3. File>Save>Save Selection as JPEG Images...(name the resulting file whatever you like). (Note: avidemux seems to mess up the colorspace of the outputted images, so beware. Hopefully they fix it.)

Having trouble with this step - in Avidemux, there is no "save selection as JPG images" option.

I can either save the video, or save a single frame, but there doesn't seem to be an option for saving the edited clip as a collection of images...

They removed that feature in Avidemux 2.6, you need Avidemux 2.5

 

[Cse]

They removed that feature in Avidemux 2.6, you need Avidemux 2.5

Ah, ok. Thanks.

 

[hesido]

Thread revive!

I've got Photoshop CS3. I don't want to install the Quicktime bullcrap to import video files. Does it natively support opening image sequences? (Not the extentded version btw)

I hear some have CS5 but are having problems with certain codecs with the video import options, an image sequence import feature could help with that too, no?

 

[Coreda]

Thread revive!

I've got Photoshop CS3. I don't want to install the Quicktime bullcrap to import video files. Does it natively support opening image sequences? (Not the extentded version btw)

I hear some have CS5 but are having problems with certain codecs with the video import options, an image sequence import feature could help with that too, no?

First time seeing this thread. Have to say, having used AviDemux for exporting JPGs previously many times it horribly compresses the frame quality. I've been trying PotPlayer's built-in consecutive image capture (Ctrl+G) recently, works well and has some nice options, as well as PNG output.

 

[fatty]

I'm trying to edit an existing gif through Gimp (very new to this). When I open up the existing pitbull bud light gif (I want to photoshop someone else's head on) in Gimp, it will show all of the layers on the side in the layers menu. But when I try to click on any of the layers, the image in the middle that I have to edit won't change so I can edit it. It is just stuck on the last layer, which in this case is layer 38. Anyone familiar with Gimp know what I am doing wrong? Is there any other alternatives to Gimp that are free where it makes it easy to modify an existing gif? Thanks.

 

[AuthenticM]

BUMP

I have a collection of jpgs that are 2.67MBs in size together. When I make a gif out of them, the file size is slightly over 20MBs, almost 10x the size and that's even after culling 17% of the images from the batch.

Why ?

 

[CyclopsRock]

BUMP

I have a collection of jpgs that are 2.67MBs in size together. When I make a gif out of them, the file size is slightly over 20MBs, almost 10x the size and that's even after culling 17% of the images from the batch.

Why ?

Because .gif's don't really compress, they just strip out a load of colours (so for vector images or flat colour images, they can make very small bitmaps). JPGs actually have compression built in, so they're much smaller despite - in this case - probably having more information.

What can I say - .gif's aren't very good.

 

[hateradio]

GIF is, interesting enough, a lossless CODEC, though there is a lossy method for it.

Just share the "GIFV" when you upload it to Imgur.