Different programs to create banners and GIF animations

The last few years, the number of people who ventures on the development of web pages has increased. Essential elements of these pages are the animations and banners. We’ll compare some of the options for doing this: Advanced Gif Animator, Easy Gif Animator and AVD Animated Gif Producer.

Starting with Advanced Gif Animator, we need to say that it is a fantastic tool for the creation of GIF files. It counts with a series of assistants that allow us to define many options and add a lot of effects to the images. Moreover, it comes incorporated with an exporter which allows us to transform the animation frames into a lot of individual graphic files from other formats or into an AVI video. Furthermore, it counts with a utility to generate HTML codes and an image editor, basic but their own.

Easy Gif Animator is simpler to use tan the previous one. As soon as we open the program, we find an assistant for the creation of animations, banners and animated buttons. This will help us to create them on a basic form and then we’ll remain on the editor so we can add different effects to the frames. Although it counts with lesser tools than other programs, the use of them is extremely easy, so what we lose in options, we gain it in usefulness.

AVD Animate Gif Producer maybe the most complete one, although it is the most difficult one to use as well. It counts with different anti-aliasing filters and transition effects that are individually applicable to each image. Another distinctive tool is the possibility to do captures of an AVI video format file and automatically add them to the animation, being able also to zoom them or move forward frame by frame.

Internet’s peak caused that nowadays a lot of applications are developed to create GIF files. We can say that with their particularities, these 3 are the most complete ones. Probably for someone who is first starting, Easy Gif Animator could be the most convenient, as with its assistants not only makes it easy the task, but also it starts giving us ideas for the creation possibilities. Then, for those advanced users, for sure they will require the multiple options as regards filters and effects that Advanced Gif Animator and AVD Animated Gif Producer offer.

Create animations and banners with Advanced GIF Animator

A good option when creating animations and GIF format banners for our web pages is Advanced GIF Animator. This application is really practical and of easy and intuitive use, with many options to take advantage from. To create an animation, once we open the program, we select File>New, and an emerging window will pop up asking to list all the images to be included on the animation.

Advanced GIF Animator supports the most popular graphic formats like TIF, PNG, GIF, JPG, PCX, BMP and many more. Once we finish adding them, we click on Next. It’s important to point out that after this process you can still add more images, or reorganize or delete them. In many cases, not all the images are of the same size. However, Advanced GIF Animator scales the animation taking the biggest one as the base, so in the next dialog box we’ll need to do some configuration if we want the smallest to be on the upper left corner or at the centre of the frame. Later on, we’ll be able to decide this individually for each of them, but for now is an applied format to all the animation frames.

Once we get to the next screen, we have to specify on its top part, the exhibition length of each image. The bottom part of the window asks to enter the number of repetitions that the GIF file will do when visualized.

Once we’ve done this, we’ll have the images loaded to the Advanced GIF Animator main window. We’ll see them on the left side, organized vertically from top to bottom. Clicking on each frame we’ll be able to edit them individually, having the possibility to set length, slide and place in the animation, as well as easily edit them with a little application that comes with software.

In order to change the order in which an image appears, on the upper bar we’ll see, on the “Frame Toolbar”, a few buttons with, an up arrow on one of them, and the other one with a down arrow. By pressing them we’ll be able to move the image selected. Using the same bar, we can also insert a blank sheet and add or remove images.

To see how the project is going on, on the upper part, on the “Animation Toolbar” there’s a PLAY button that will run the animation up to where we did it. Once we are satisfied with the result, we can just save.

To create a banner with Advanced GIF Animator, the process is even easier, as it counts with an assistant. We select File>Banner Wizard and a window will emerge where we’ll choose its size, being able to adapt itself even to the size of any image.

The next step is adding a background to the banner, having the option to put an image, a full color or 2 colors that can be graduated depending on predefined diagrams. On the next dialog box we can add the text to be included on the banner, with different format options to choose from. On the upper part we have a series of effects that can be applied to the text sample and length options, with buttons to pre-visualize the banner situated on the left side.

Once finished, we’ll go back to the Advanced GIF Animator main screen, being able to edit the final result as if it was an animation as described on the first part.

As we could see, Advanced GIF Animator is a tool that allows us to create GIF files in a very simple way and within a few steps, offering multiples options to do it.

Learn image editing and website design

Design and image editing have developed in such a way that there are few users who haven´t heard or used at least one image editing or photo retouching software. The possibilities are limitless when it comes to editing images thanks to plugins, filters and lots of other features added in each release.

Next, we will cover the essential aspects of image editing. In this case, we will review Blender, The Gimp, Easy Web Editor and Advanced Gif Animator.

Gimp

The Gimp is an image manipulation program usually used to create images and logos. You can perform several tasks such as changing the size of image, image and color editing and also creating combinations of images through the use of layers. You can also make simple animated images, also known as GIFs. Also, to save disk space, any format can be saved with an archive extension such as ZIP, GZ or BZ2 and The Gimp will transparently compress the file without you needing to do any extra steps.

The Gimp reads and writes most graphic file formats. For those used to handling design programs, The Gimp can be an interesting alternative to explore. However, for those learning the basics of image editing, The Gimp may take some time to master since they take a while getting used to its multiple window interface.

Blender

Blender is a 3D design tool delivering a wide range of features for modeling, rendering, animation, post-production and creation of products.
Blendersupports the following formats: JPG, Iris, TGA, SGI, IFF and Inventor.
At first glance, Blender doesn´t seem like a program to start practicing 3D design since its interface may result awkward and hard getting used to.

Blender presents many professional features such as: Interactive 3D paint for vertex weighting, a wide range of 3D object types including polygon meshes, NURBS surfaces, bezier and B-spline curves, metaballs, vector fonts (TrueType, PostScript, OpenType), flexible and fully configurable window layout with as many screen setups as you prefer and thousands of amazing components.
For this reason we emphasize the lack of a wizard or assistant in order to guide novice users in the field of 3D modeling, mostly due to its great complexity. Since blender provides a large amount of features, some users get lost in the process of learning.

Easy Web Editor

If we feel like exploring website design, Easy Web Editor Is the perfect software to start with since it´s fully visual, meaning is has no HTML Code. However, expert users will also find themselves pleased by the advanced features it offers, such as inserting HTML for instance.

Easy Web Editor´s extremely simple visual interface enables users to gradually get into web design. Easy Web Editor also features simultaneous browsing and editing); visual linking, meaning that you can select the link destination with active previews, even when you show separate popup windows and/or insert complex frame-to-frame links.

Easy Web Editor Posses an animated tutorial that will help users in the process of learning while clearing lost of doubts.
With Easy Web Editor you can create websites with text, multimedia content, images, flash animations and more, without needing any previous HTML knowledge. What´s more, users can also upload content automatically from the program.

Advanced Gif Animator

Advanced Gif Animator is a powerful tool for creating animated GIFs images in a matter of seconds. While Advanced Gif Animator provides several features, it´s specifically designed to create high quality banners, images and buttons, fast and easily. You will be able to create infinite animations loops, establish or changing frame sequences and convert GIF files to BMP format.
Advanced Gif Animator is full set of editing options such as duplication, mergers, cropping, re-sizing, rotation and frame flipping; capability to create animated GIF-files from sets of BMP, JPEG, ICO, and Windows Metafiles; color palette support; .avi and .ani file export and import.

The interface is so simple and intuitive that one hardly needs the User Manual to create animated GIFs. Maybe the latter is not as fancy and colorful as other web design programs, but it´s an excellent choice for those who are making their first steps in the field of GIF animation.

As previously stated, design and image editing continues to grow quickly, that is why it´s essential to cover the some of the aspects these activities demand. These four applications are essential tools for inexperienced and advanced users alike and since they complement each other, they provide all the necessary tools for creating images, animated GIFs websites and much, much more.
For this reason, for creating 3D elements Blender is the perfect solution, to work with digital images we´ll use The Gimp. On the other hand, for web design we can trust Easy Web Editor and last but not least, we´ll be able to create animated GIFs using Advanced Gif Animator.