spring break is this week but let's talk animated.gif + a tutorial.

yes i know it's spring break.
yes i know we are having fun and have tales to tell.

but.....

today i'm going to get all techie on you. i was asked about the animated gif. i made in photoshop elements for this photo-shoot post and about how i did it and today i am going to show you!!

i had seen these around and wanted to do some myself but had NO IDEA where to start. so i decided to start at the beginning.
good a place as any.
so what does that mean? it means i had to figure out how to do it. on. my. own.
i have yet to take a course on photoshop elements, have not read the manual and figured - how hard could it be?
turns out...pretty darn hard! {not as straight forward as i first thought.}

so to the web i went.
i found a great tutorial over at censational girl.....but she uses a program for pc's only - next!
i hit up youtube and found some video tutorials and after 5 of them i settled on one.
AND after listening to some guy listening to himself speak for 11 minutes {of a 13 minute tutorial} he finally got to the point and i got my moving picture.

so here goes...and it's only a four step process!

step one - export your photo's from your iphoto or equivalent. now this i had to do twice because i had exported them to large. {i made the mistake and am passing my wisdom on to you! see how i have helped already??} follow the prompts on the photo's.....

so once you have done that, open your photoshop elements and we are ready to go to.......

step two - open all your photo's on photoshop elements settling on the first photo in the sequence when you are done.

you can see at the bottom of the screen i did a photo with four layers so i have all four open.

step three - now comes the part where you have to listen......you want to "layer" your photo's one on top of the other, with your first in the sequence being on the bottom and the last being on the top.
you use your move tool and drag and drop.

you can see in the photo above in the side box that says layers...all my photos are there in sequence.

you're almost done!!

now you are ready to save. one thing i like to do though is highlight the background layer in your layers box just because. i don't know why but i just make sure.

step four - save!
go to file then scroll down to save for web...this is when you will find out if you saved your photo to large or hit the bullseye.

once you hit saved for web, this window will open (shown below) if you have saved to large you will see something like a large nose or arm pit in these windows. you want to see your whole beautiful wonderful picture here!

there are a few steps to complete on the page above to get your shot moving and grooving and here they are: {i've added some arrows to direct you}

first, make sure you have a gif file {my top left arrow}

second, make sure you click animate {the second top left arrow...and i see by this i took my photo before i clicked it! oops!}

third, you want to check that the loop box in checked {bottom left arrow} 

fourth, you want to check on the colours tab and that it is set at 256 {right side arrow}

drum roll please....click the ok button at the top and if your picture does one move {it won't go through the whole thing} then you have done it!!

now save...make sure the .gif is there. be sure.

now you can open your blog, go to new post and attach you photo and watch it move and shake!

i hope this helps clear a few things up and that you have fun with it!!!

i love to keep my finger on the trigger button when i'm photographing and catch the action as it's happening and what a better way to showcase it.