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Anna Carey
Participant
April 14, 2020
Question

Looping .gif issue

  • April 14, 2020
  • 3 replies
  • 1016 views

Newbie here, doing a test project. Have built a little animation in AE CC and rendered it to a .mov file. Following an online tutorial, the guy has suggested to create a looping gif file, that you import the file to PS. When I try to "import/video to layers" the file into PS CC I get "Could not complete the video frames to layers command because the file could not be opened"

 

From research it could perhaps be something to do with QuickTime? I'm unsure what to do to fix this so I can build a gif to share with others

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3 replies

Warren Heaton
Community Expert
Warren HeatonCommunity Expert
Community Expert
April 14, 2020

The feature that you're using is "File > Import > Video Frames to Layers..." (it's not "video to layers").  It stacks video frames as still images which is helpful for a variety of things, but not for creating an Animated GIF from a video file.

 

To turn a video file into an Animated GIF, use File > Open.  This will place your video file into a Timeline inside of your PSD document.  You can then use File > Export > Save for Web (Legacy)... to create an Animated GIF.  Keep in mind that the Animated GIF export has a frame count limit (I think it's 500 frames).  If you happen to have a long video, the resulting Animated GIF will just play the first 500 frames (or whatever the limit is). 

 

 

    Roland Kahlenberg
    Roland Kahlenberg
    Legend
    April 14, 2020

    Use the QuickTime Animation CODEC to ensure your AE-rendered MOVs get into PS without any issues.AME does GIFs but PS allows you to optimize palette/colors for 8-bit (GIF) output.

    Very Advanced After Effects Training | Adaptive & Responsive Toolkits | Intelligent Design Assets (IDAs) | MoGraph Design System DEV
      davescm
      Community Expert
      davescmCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      April 14, 2020

      You could miss out Photoshop altogether and just export from AE, via AME, as an animated GIF. 

      Alternatively export as an image sequence and load that sequence of images into Photoshop to make your GIF there.

       

      Dave

      Warren Heaton
      Community Expert
      Warren HeatonCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      April 14, 2020

      Last I checked, the AME GIF export still introduces a color shift if white is used requiring a quick trip to Photoshop to correct in the Color Table to change the really light gray that results to #FFFFFF to get back to white.

       

       

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