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austinmdiamond
Known Participant
September 4, 2022
Question

Animating on Photoshop

  • September 4, 2022
  • 1 reply
  • 4056 views

Hi! I just started trying to create an animation on Photoshop. The problem is I can't figure out how to export the video and keep it looking the same way it does when I play it in Photoshop. First of all, the white lines move either slower or faster. I tried keeping it at the Document Frame Rate of 30 and the exported video has the white lines moving WAY faster than when it's in Photoshop. I tried estimating the number of frames per second within Photoshop and it seems like it's only 12! But then when I tried it at that setting, it moved way slower than what was in Photoshop. Perhaps related to this, is the videos are only exporting for a total of one second for some reason.

 

See attached screengrab for how it's supposed to look!

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1 reply

Conrad_C
Community Expert
Conrad_CCommunity Expert
Community Expert
September 4, 2022

What settings (including file format) are you using when you export the video?

How are you playing back the exported video, where you notice the problem?

 

It looks like a frame animation, so that would typically be exported as an animated GIF file. But how an animated GIF file plays back can vary greatly depending on what program is playing it back. For example, in which web browser does the problem happen? Or are you previewing it using the QuickLook feature in the macOS Finder desktop?

    A
    austinmdiamondAuthor
    Known Participant
    September 5, 2022

    I'm trying to export it as an .mp4. The document frame rate says it is at 30 fps. Right now I have 24 frames in my document all with no delays. As I noted it is exporting the video as only one second long, and I think the problem is that it's just trying to squeeze everything into that one second. (When I play the mp4 the video is only one second long and it is SUPER fast, whereas in Photoshop it takes 2 seconds and it plays back at the correct, slower speed.)

    A
    austinmdiamondAuthor
    Known Participant
    September 6, 2022

    Sorry about the delay…it was a three-day holiday weekend in the United States. Anyway, thanks to your additional info, I think you might be running into a fundamental difference in the way playback speed and duration is handled by traditional video vs. animated GIF. This is something that’s not often discussed, so it’s easy to miss.

     

    Traditional video is very strict about the frame rate and duration of the overall clip, obviously so that you can count on a video to play back consistently on any video equipment. But animated GIF is set up to be driven by the duration of each frame, which is totally different. Also, if frame duration is set to 0 sec, that tells an animated GIF player to simply throw the frames on the screen as fast as it can…so the actual playback duration can vary a lot depending on the speed of the computer it’s viewed on.

     

    You can see that difference in time handling in the Photoshop Timeline panel, which accommodates both. If you set up a Frame Animation, you get to set each frame to a duration,  and individual frames can be different durations. But there is no frame rate or overall duration — those are derived from the individual frame durations. Now, if you choose Export > Render Video directly from here, you are crossing over from frame animation to traditional video, so the time calculation must change: The number of frames is mapped directly to the frame rate. So if you have 24 frames and you set Render Video to 30 frames per second, then you will get an exported video of 800 milliseconds (8/10ths sec). Because 24 frames is not enough to fill one 30fps second of video.

     

    If I’m right about this, there are two ways you can get the duration you want:

     

    • Create the animation timeline with 60 frames. So that when you render out traditional video set to 30 frames a second, the 60 animation frames will map to two seconds of 30 frames each. 
    • Click the Convert to Video Timeline button, which converts the animation frames into a single video clip. The clip starts out 24 frames long (less than one second at 30fps), so drag the right edge of the converted clip until it reaches the duration you want. The disadvantage of this method is you lose control over the individual frames, so if you want to be able to continue adjusting the animation, use the first method instead. 

    I just created 60 frames and tried exporting it. The video is now two seconds long, but it is playing WAY faster than it does when played from the PS timeline. If I count how many frames pass by on the timeline per second, I get 12. 

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