Have you ever wondered how animated GIFs are created? The author of the lesson offers you overnight to master some of the secrets of animation with the help of this lesson. You will also learn how to use the Timeline, which is available in Photoshop CS6. And now let’s start!
The result of the lesson.
Step 1
Create a new document (Ctrl + N) with a file size of 800 x 500 pixels. Fill the background with any color you want. Now go to the menu Layers – Style layer – Overlay gradient (Layer> Layer Styles> Gradient Overlay). Apply the following settings: Style Radial (Radial), colors from black (# 000000) to blue (# 54799b) to be used in the center.
Step 2
Create a new layer and name it. Noise layer. Choose a tool Fill (Paint Bucket Tool) and fill the created layer with a dark color (# 231f20). Keep active the layer Noise layer and go to the menu Filter – Noise – Add Noise (Filter> Noise> Add Noise). In the filter settings dialog box, set these values: Effect (Amount) 3%, distribution Uniform (Uniform) and click OK.
Step 3
Press the key combination (Ctrl + U) and in the correction settings dialog box that appears, enter values Saturation (Saturation) 100%: Change this layer’s blending mode to Soft light (Soft Light).
Step 4
Add any text you want. Here we will use the text of the logo of the site 123RF. In layer styles use Stroke (Stroke). Select stroke size by your preference.
Step 5
In this step, we will create a glowing effect for the text using layer styles. Double click on the layer to bring up the style settings window. In order to customize the layer styles, use the screenshots below.
Stamping (Bevel Emboss)
Inner shadow (Inner Shadow)
Internal glow (Inner Glow)
Color overlay (Color Overlay)
External glow (Outer Glow)
Shadow (Drop Shadow)
Step 6
Once you are done creating light effects using layer styles, go to the layers palette and reduce this layer to Fillings (Fill) at 0%.
Step 7
Duplicate the layer you created in step 5 and disable this copy of all layer styles. Adjust the styles now like this:
Inner shadow (Inner Shadow)
Internal glow (Inner Glow)
Step 8
Below is the result after you have applied the layer styles.
Step 9
Now we will create moving light spots. Create 5 layers on top of the existing ones, and rename them as 1,2,3, R and F. If you have your own text, create layers according to your letters. Group these layers in a folder that give the name Light spots and change the blending mode to Lightening basics (Color Dodge).
Activate the tool Brush (Brush Tool), select a soft brush, set Opacity (Opacity) 95% and white spots draw specks on top of the text. For each letter, a separate light spot on its layer. Below in the screenshot you can see how the author looks at the layers in the layers palette.
Step 10
Now go to the menu Window – Timeline (Window> Timeline). You will notice that your layers are already built in this palette in its left part. Select each of the five layers with light spots that are in the group. Light spots and make sure that the current time indicator (blue slider) is on the zero frame. Now on each layer in the group, when it is active, click on the option Position (Position) to create a keyframe.
Step 11
Install the current time indicator (blue slider) on the mark 01:00 F and move the layers with light spots along the path of their movement relative to the outline of the letter.
Step 12
This will look like the initial position of the light spot on the letters. Move the current time indicator along the scale and move the layers with light spots creating keyframes. Continue to move them until you finish moving the speck over the entire letter of each text layer. For instructions, see a few screenshots below.
Step 13
This is how the time scale will look after moving light spots and creating key frames. Notice that the keyframe is at the point where the speck is changing in your animation.
Step 14
Once everything is ready, go to the menu File – Save for Web (File> Save for Web) and apply the settings as shown in the screenshot. After that press the button Save (Save) and save the animation in GIF format.
Selective (Selective)
Random (Diffusion)
Constantly (Forever)
Step 15
Here is our very cool animated film with moving light spots. The author wishes you success and achieving the level of pros J
