Unable to export animation in any format

[felixwells]

Oh dear.  I'm a rank beginner but was pleased to manage a 40 frame simple animation that I wanted to turn into a gif.  And my god, I just cannot seem to publish or export it in any format that works!  It looks great.  I run it as a test (on browsers) and it works...but nothing else.  I've read all the forums, which get far too complex for me.  I'm missing something simple.  Apologies for the stupidity!  I'm on a mac running Adobe Animate CC 2017.  Thanks!

[kglad]

is your animation on the main timeline or is in a movieclip that's on the main tmeline?

did you use file>export>export animated gif..?

[felixwells]

I did use file export and so on, and it creates a still image unfortunately.  As for main timeline or movieclip, I don't know what these terms mean.  I have about 8 layers in the timeline.  The animation is simply the entire timeline with all the layers.  Do I perhaps need to compress these layers into something before exporting?  Thank you for helping!

[Colin Holgate]

It's the "and so on" part that is important. Most other exports are still images. You want:

File/Export/Export Animated GIF...

In the export dialog there are a lot of options, where you can set whether the animation is looped, and what colors it uses. There's a play button in there too, so you can see what the animation is going to look like.

Also, not all programs can view animated gif. Is it also a still image if you open the animated gif in a web browser?

[felixwells]

Thanks, yes I definitely did export to animated gif.  The problem is when I do this, it shows "Export Image."  Is there something I should be selecting to make it an export of a video or movie or set of images?  And no, it it merely an image in a web browser.  Thank you for helping!

[Colin Holgate]

You shouldn't need to have anythings selected, and the dialog that comes up doesn't have any export button of any kind. In the bottom right it should show a Save button.

Would you be able to take a screenshot of the export dialog, in case that helps give us more ideas?

[just.emma]

You should be seeing this option:

After that, the "Export Image" window pops up and you can choose your optimization settings; you don't have to change anything but these settings can help to reduce the file size of your GIF if needed.  Then, in the bottom right corner, click "Save" and your animated GIF will be exported.