Making Animated GIFs.

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Phraxus
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Making Animated GIFs.

I recently came across an old and rather obscure cartoon from my childhood, which features a cute little inflation scene that I wouldn't mind sharing with the community.  However, simply posting a sequence of screencaps doesn't really do the scene justice, so I was wondering if anyone here on the board knew of any software (preferrably free, or at least very low-priced) that I could use to capture the scene as an animated gif?  I'm not very tech-savvy, so the more user-friendly, the better. 

Any recommendations at all would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

- Phraxus

"A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men."

pballooned

 You can pause the video, and capture the screen with a button on the keyboard called "impr Pant (pet sis)". Then go to the program and paste it. This can be a bit tedious, so only get the key frames. A free program you can use to make gifs, is Game Maker. However, in my case a gif in which every image has a big resolution gets very slow with Game Maker. But my computer has 224 MB of RAM. Maybe you would have a different experience.

 Another option is to give the video to someone who knows how to make gifs. If you describe the scene, you might attract the interest of people who like it.

Phraxus
Phraxus's picture

The button you mentioned doesn't seem to exist on my keyboard, though I use a laptop, which may be why.  I can give the free version of GameMaker I found a try, but I'm anything but computer savvy, so the learning curve is liable to be fairly steep.

The scene in question is from an old cartoon - originally from Russia I believe - called "The Fabulous Adventures of Baron Munchausen" (not to be confused with the live-action Terry Gilliam film).  It features one of the film's characters, a rotund, slightly bumbling man named Hurricane, using his signature power - his hurricane-force breath.  His inhalation is a drawn-out process, during which his body inflates like a balloon, swelling to several times it's normal size and bursting several of the buttons on his shirt in the process. 

The scene was one of the very first examples of inflation that I encountered as a child, and I credit it - along with several other cartoons and storybooks - with helping to plant the seeds of what would eventually become my fetish.  The film itself is pretty obscure and virtually impossible to find nowadays - most of the clips that were on youtube have since been removed, save for one brief, French-language clip, which contains the aformentioned scene.  I was able to save a copy of the clip to my hard drive, so even if the video vanishes, I have a copy that I can (hopefully) use to produce a gif.

Here's a screencap from the inflation scene itself, just in case people were curious:

"A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men."

LutherVKane
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Check out BenderConverter. You can upload a video and convert it to a number of formats, including animated gif.

Phraxus
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Thanks.  I'll see if I can separate the inflation sequence itself from the rest of the video and gif it using the converter.  I'm not sure how to isolate the sequence itself - or if I can using the software on my computer - but I'll see what I can do.

I'll keep you posted.

"A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men."

pballooned

 Often Windows come with a program called "Windows Movie Maker". With it you can watch the video and cut out parts of it. Luckily it comes with instructions.

Phraxus
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I've managed to get the scene captured using Windows Movie Maker and BenderConverter.  I'll upload it to the gallery next chance I get. 

Many thanks to everyone who offered assistance and advice.  I deeply appreciate it all the  help.

 

"A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men."

Phraxus
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Okay, apparently I can't upload animated gifs to the galleries here.  Should I try linking them in the forum here, or is there a way around this problem?

"A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men."

LutherVKane
LutherVKane's picture

How big is the file? The gallery won't accept any images larger than 4MB.

Phraxus
Phraxus's picture

Ah, that would explain it then.  The file itself is just a touch over 4MB.  Fortunately, I saved multiple versions of the file at different resolutions.  I have a smaller one that should fit within the restrictions.

Thanks. ^_^

"A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men."