[TUTORIAL] How to make overlaying gifs.
Hi ! This post is kinda the end of the answer to what anon previously asked about how I make my gifs. I wrote a full step-by-step tutorial for Photoshop users who’d like to learn how to do it. It’s my first time posting something like this so I apologize if there’s any confusion. My Photoshop is settled in French, but I requested a friend to screenshot the English version, hence the different gifs used in the screenshots. If there’s anything that’s missing or confusing, feel free to message me. Constructive criticism is always appreciated !
STEP 1 : First go to Photoshop. If you didn’t do it before, open the picture/edit you want to apply the gif to. Now that it’s done, go to File, Open and then go the gif you want to use, click and then it’s going to open the gif in Photoshop as a document.
STEP 2 : Then go to Window and select Timeline. Now in the zone down your work space, you can see the editing tool open on the deconstructed gif. On the right of it, you’ll see the menu icon (it looks like 4 little horizontal straight lines). Click on it and chose Select All Frames.
STEP 3 : Then go to the list of layers, on the far right. For this part, you want to be sure to select ALL of them. To do that, just click on the first layer and scroll to the last. Then you use SHIFT+Click and it will automatically select every layers in between. When it’s done, go back to the Timeline menu and click on Convert to Video Timeline.
STEP 4 : Now you go back to the upper part of your work space and select Filter. In the menu, choose Convert for Smart Filters. At this point you should get something that kind of looks like this :
Then you just drag the final gif layer you can see, onto the picture you want to use. You can also resize the gif layer as you want, it will not break it. If it appears with an all-black background, go the layers options and select Screen (my Photoshop is in french so it’s written as Superposition on the screenshot, but it’s the same option). You have to re-open the Timeline tool before going to STEP 5, so be sure that it’s running by clicking on Create Video Timeline, or the gif will crash when saved.
STEP 5 : You’re almost at the end ! Now you got to be sure the little grey thingy (sorry idk the english name for that haha) at the end of the timeline is positioned at the end of your gif layer. Sometimes it’s already well-positioned, sometimes it’s not. If it’s not, you just click and drag it to the right place. It might go from this :
and go back like this. See how it’s just at the tip end of the layer ? Do not worry if, unlike what you see on my screenshot, the layer of your picture doesn’t appear in the Timeline tool. It might be because the picture you’re working on is also open as the Background. It’s okay and doesn’t change anything to the process.
STEP 6 : Now that you’ve got everything settled, you got to save your work. So what you’re going to do is that you open File. You select Export and choose Save for Web (Legacy). It’s going to open a new window with lots of options around and the preview o your edit.
STEP 7 : See on the right and lower part of the window, there’s a category named Animation. Click on Looping Options and change it to Forever. This will ensure that your gif endlessly runs over you edit.
STEP 8 : Now, just to be sure, click on the little Play icon under Looping Options to admire your masterpiece ! Be sure to hit Save and voilà ! You’re done and on your road to master overlaying gifs on pictures. It might look a bit hard at first, but you will soon get the hang of it.
Hope this had been useful for some users ! Credit goes to hocus-pocus-art senpai since this step-by-step is based off her french tutorial.~
