Adding GIF File To Your Presentation
Wednesday, November 02, 2022
As we all know, Doodly makes animated whiteboard videos. The main animated element in Doodly is the drawing effect but once the graphic is drawn, it becomes static, it just stays in its position. The drawing effect is awesome but what if you wanted an object to move after it’s been drawn on the whiteboard? Say you have a gear and you want the little gears to turn while the rest of the images are being drawn? Or a clock with a time-ticking vibe?
One way to do this is to have gif files added to your presentation. The good news is, Doodly supports importing of gif files into your video. In this blog, we are going to look at the use of gif in your Doodly animation, its limitations, the pros and cons, and we will also see how we can convert a video into a gif file. Before all that, let us first define what a GIF file is.
What is a GIF file?
GIF stands for Graphics Interchange Format. You see them all over the internet. An early example is the classic dancing baby from the 90s.
A gif file is an animated element. It is basically a series of still images that loop one after another and because they are 8-bit graphics and they only support 256 colors, they tend to have a really low quality so keep that in mind when using them in Doodly. It is best to consider them as accents rather than the main attraction in your presentation.
These days, GIFs are often used in memes.
Why Add GIFs?
There are several reasons why some Doodlers use gif on their videos:
- It makes your video interesting
- It draws attention to reinforce your concept
- It brings whiteboard videos to life
- It adds a little visual effect
Adding a GIF to your video
So let’s try to incorporate a gif file into a scene in Doodly.
The scene below shows an image of a police officer sitting in front of a desk and there’s a clock over her shoulder.
The objective is to convey a sense of time passing but if we preview this scene, you’ll see that the only real animation is the hand drawing the elements.
What we’d like to see is for the clock to actually move. To do that, let’s try using a gif clock image. Let’s upload the gif file just the way we would normally upload any other graphic or assets.
After uploading, we need to replace the previous clock’s image with the gif clock file. You will see that once again the hand draws the clock but this time, the clock’s hands are moving right after it has been drawn.
GIF Limitations
As lovely as it is, GIFs are not always spot on when used in Doodly. It also has its limitations but we can always find a way around it.
Let’s take a look at some of its limitations and our work around to fix the issue.
Erase gesture
ISSUE: When a GIF is added and you preview your scene, you will see that the hand with the eraser appears, doing an erase gesture trying to erase the image before the actual gif image comes up on the screen. Who erases before drawing in a clean canvas? I guess some do but most don’t, so we have to correct that.
RESOLUTION: To fix this, we have to go to Video Settings then turn off the Erase Mode.
First frame is empty
ISSUE: As you can see on the image below, our gif file is saved as an image in a blank white rectangle box. You don’t see the gif bubbles and that is because when this gif was created, the first frame captured was empty, then the succeeding frames were when the bubbles appeared. It can be a little difficult to work with a gif that starts blank because you can’t see where exactly the animation will appear when you play it.
RESOLUTION: We can’t change how it is saved so what we can do is just preview the gif then try to adjust it when you’re in edit mode. It will be a trial and error kind of thing.
Non-transparent GIFs covers images
ISSUE: Most GIFs are not transparent, it’s a solid image. While they generally don’t support transparency like png files, there are also some GIF files that are transparent which will require only minimal adjustment when added to your Doodly scene.
With non-transparent gifs, they can cover some portions of your other images that are saved in your Doodly scene. With the example that we used, the water line is covered if the GIF image is moved up.
RESOLUTION: Unless you change your gif file into a transparent one, there’s really no fix to that. The best we can do is to make tiny movements in our scene. Be extra careful with where you place your GIF file, especially if you have several tiny images around it as it may cover some objects in your video.
Asset layering issue
ISSUE: If you placed a non-transparent GIF on top of other assets, it covers the other assets in your video.
RESOLUTION: The asset layering needs to be observed making sure that you placed the GIF file on top of the object related to it. You have to bring the gif file forward so it can be on top of other graphics. In our example video, the sequencing in our Layers menu is aquarium first, next is the bubble gif then last is the fish.
Scribbling blank image
ISSUE: So we already turned off the eraser but there’s the scribble effect where it’s trying to draw something when it’s really just a blank space. This is because since the gif file is non-transparent, it’s trying to draw the entire box where the bubble is on.
RESOLUTION: From the Edit Asset settings, we need to change the Draw animation to Fade. To do this, click your gif file, then select the pencil icon located above the gif image along with the other menus. Look for Reveal Mode then choose Fade from the dropdown menu. Hit Save and Return after. We can change the gif’s animation duration to 1 second since we don’t need it to fade for 3 seconds. In our example, let’s also move the fish over a little so we can cover the area where the bubbles appear.
USING YOUR VIDEO AS A GIF FILE
So how do we exactly use a specific video as a gif file? The answer is… we have to convert it! But how? Well, we need to use a third-party website that supports video conversion to gif format. There are tons of websites available online, you can search on google and I’m sure you’ll have several website options to choose from.
Here’s an example of a Doodly project with a gif file:
Just be mindful that these third-party sites tend to have lots of ads and they might prompt you to download other programs so be careful where you click when using a conversion service.
Also, just a tip, keep your video clips relatively short and then let them loop as your scene plays out.
A higher frame rate will produce a smoother animation but it does make the file larger. You can play around with it until you get the best output result and don’t forget to just have fun.
Here’s a sample of a video-to-gif conversion site:
Pros And Cons
GIF is a great graphic addition to your Doodly presentation. Since the file size is smaller, you get to load their images quicker. It makes the presentation look good. Another benefit of having a gif added to your video is the ability to convey a message with emotion since it shows movement. It is amusing and it really captures the attention of your viewers.
On the other hand, it also has its disadvantages and that includes the limited color pattern. Most of the time, we see a gif image that is pixelated and that is because it only uses a color palette of 256 colors, unlike other images. Also, some of these images are dependent on internet connection. If you have a poor net connection, the images tend to lag resulting in a less desirable version of what it’s supposed to be.
In Conclusion:
Depending on how GIFs are used, it can make or break your presentation. It definitely adds value to your video but as we have mentioned, it is better to use it as an accessory and not as the main attraction to your videos. If you placed too many gifs in your presentation, that may look unprofessional and we do not want that. Use it wisely, keep it simple to have a presentation that converts! 🙂
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