#it kinda... looked less yellow in photoshop

[echochamber]

4 hours and 1 cigarette break study

[I.D. A digital painting of Laurey Williams and Jud Fry from Oklahoma! West End 2023 revival. Laurey is a woman in her 20s with long dark curly hair, Jud is a man in his 30s with long blonde hair, he’s wearing a brown suit. The painting depicts a wedding scene from the end of the show — a moment before their kiss. End I. D.]

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[sunglassesmish]

I hope you don’t mind asking but you consistently have some of the best 911 gifs. How are your gifs so sharp? And the coloring so good? Could you do a little tutorial about your giffing?

omg thank you!!! this gets pretty long so i’m putting the tutorial under the cut

so firstly, i use kmplayer to screencap. the most important part though is the quality of the episode you have. you always want to work with 1080p, and my file is around 2gb. that is how my gifs always turn out ‘the best’ as you say 🤗 of course, colouring and sharpening help a lot, but if you don’t have a good download, your gifs can be helped but won’t be the best possible.

this is the gif i’m making having only been cropped and sharpened. i’m gonna show you how i make a gif and my colouring process (which, for this one, is admittedly pretty short and simple compared to what i usually do.) as you can see, it’s dark and pixelated and doesn’t look that appealing, no matter how handsome they both are.

also, i forgot to screenshot this before i started but the screenshot below shows the action i use to basically get all my screencaps organised to make one gif. this is after you’ve got the screencaps into photoshop in a stack.

i can’t find the original post with the action, and i’m not sure how to share it on this post… but if it’s not that important in the scheme of this post, there are many other posts out there with actions you’ll be able to easily find and download.

anyways. so this is gonna go through the process of making a gif assuming you’ve done the process of importing the frames and sharpening. (i would normally cut out my taskbar but there are so many screenshots, it would take foreverrrr)

the next step would be cropping. this is the original:

and i’m doing a 540 x 500 gif. i like mine to be bigger so i can only get the person/people i want in the gif (sorry eddie) but sometimes if i want that it’ll be smaller, usually 540 x 400.

anyways, i crop from the edge and make it a little smaller so i don’t get the white border around it. and then i move the gif away from the top and right edge of the gif just by 3-5 pixels. which i already did here and then zoomed in:

next, image size. i honestly didn’t know about cropping it and then using image size for a few months when i started giffing (i don’t even know what i did back then not knowing that.)

then as you can see, it’s 540 x 500. if you’ve cropped it to the size you want beforehand, it’ll be automatically those dimensions.

next, we’re finally starting on colouring. i always tend to start with curves and use the middle brush on the left. the top one you use to make it darker, and the bottom you find the whitest point on the gif to make it a lot brighter. but i find the middle one colour corrects too, so it’s not too bright or dark, and is less yellow or whatever colours you don’t want.

it depends on where you click to get this result, i’m not sure how to explain what i do but i just click all over and try to get the yellows off and the skin colour to look generally the same as what they have. most of the time, if i get this accurate enough, the rest of the colouring process is just to brighten up the gif.

so, then after i got my desired result, we’re brightening it up because you can’t really see them all that well. i use brightness/contrast but i tend to use exposure the most.

as you can see, i am at +2.78 exposure which is crazy high (imo). but as that and the curves layer did a lot of the work for me, i mostly have the colouring i want.

although i think it could be a little lighter, so i add a new layer of brightness and contrast this time. i don’t brighten it all that much after that. i want to make it so that either one of their faces aren’t shining, and with too much of the exposure, it can make that happen.

next, i notice that tommy is kinda green/yellow, so i want to fix that up and make him more natural. i go to colour balance for that this time. most of the time i go to selective colour -> yellow or red, depending on how much i want to change. with selective colour, it gives you a few options in shades: cyan, magenta, yellow and black to alter, all for your specific colour.

meanwhile, colour balance changes the whole thing. since i wouldn’t mind that in this instance, i just go with colour balance.

tommy is looking less yellow and green, but still, he’s not where i want him to be. (plus oliver’s scruff area is naturally ginger so it shows up as yellow, and i want to decrease that a little.) so i go to hue/saturation, choose yellow, and decrease it a little more.

now, after this, i messed around with selective colour as i mentioned earlier and with the colour yellow and red specifically. but after comparing where i was at before, vs with those selective colour layers, i just liked that previous one more. so my last layer is the hue/saturation one. and i’m done colouring!

next, i go to my trusty camera raw filter to make them stand out more and be a little crispier.

i tend to stick to + 10 up to 30, somewhere in that range. sometimes the texture and clarity match, sometimes they don’t. it’s all up to you, but for this one, i knew it would end up a little too crispy so i didn’t go too high.

i also like to add some grain so that it’s less pixelated (it admittedly annoys me a lot when it’s got those visible square pixels all over.) i never go higher than 5 in grain, it does the job well.

after that, i’m finished with my gif!

next, we want to export the gif.

as you can see, the gif is less than 10mb, is set to loop for forever, and is made with selective diffusion. admittedly, i don’t think about that setting that much, but sometimes if it’s a lower quality gif, i’ll change it to selective/adaptive pattern instead. but that’s not relevant here.

after that, we open our gif that we just made into photoshop again. this time we want to select all frames:

and change the frame delay so it’s not as jumpy. for some reason, it automatically changes so that they alternate in frames from 0.03 to 0.07, but i want them all to be 0.05.

now that’s the last step and you just export the gif again!

this is the final gif!!!

i hope this was easy to understand! thank you for the kind words, and for asking me about my process because i’ve honestly always wanted to make a tutorial. if you have any more questions, or want to see my process colouring something more difficult to work with, let me know! 🫶

[yuriyuruandyuraart]

,,,,how do u get that fuzzy fuzz feel on ur art pieces,, is it just by usin’ noise? (As in static, I think)

oh! i experiment a lot with colors and effects (most of which i don't even remember the name SOB) but i can give you a summarized version of my steb by step on how i art

first of all, the colors!

here's the og, and you can probably see that in most of my art i tend to use grays and soft colors a lot and that's because it's easier for me to pick a 'theme' if you will? like 1 bright color that pops and the rest is a lot less harsh and that's what helps me define the contrary color and base my editing on that!

like here is where i usually choose my colors! but you can pick something darker and more saturated too idk i don't think it'll affect the end result- at least as long as you can change contrast and lighting in your program. i know color theory but not enough to explain it hhh :'D <333

so now use the wind tool on photoshop (there's some free editing versions online that will work just the same) and if you don't have or wanna use Ps, firealpaca and medibang have similar enough options- use motion blur, then the curves tool to make it look liiike

this! now blur the piece from a 5 to 10 range depending on how big your piece is, then you'll have that soft fuzzy outline! put some random static on top (very low opacity) then sharpen the whole thing if your art is very small like mine here so you can see details xD

use the lighten mode on your next layer and add a blue tint to the character (and leave the pop color untouched: here the yellow bg)

if you want a vhs look! and add more line-like static (just google static images and mess with colors/edit them yourself if you can't find any good options on your art program) and change up the hues and tints/contrast if you really wanna lean into the vhs asthetic like:

these! and add a 3D effect (or chromatic aberration? i think that's what the translation is cause my settings are in french xD do look it up if you can't find it on ibispaint, clip studio or whatever program you're using!)

i really suck at explaining so i don't consider this a tutorial, but mostly me rambling about effects and editing hhh but honestly? best advice i can give you is try every single effect you can and see how it looks with hues and color changers added on top of it!

stumble upon new effects and learn how to replicate them without needing to rely on special layers or tools if you're looking to improve your coloring!! >:Dc i only use these because my version of sai doesn't have a blur tool cause i pick the colors myself in most cases now :') but as i said i'm bad at explaining so hope it kinda sorta helped? a little? hhh<3333

[babygirlmickey]

hi! i’m wondering if you can explain a bit how you made those gifs if ian looking at mickey in the s4 ep at the party. like how you made their skin tones show and stuff cause the original scene is really yellow? i hope that makes sense. no pressure im just curious!!

hiii sorry I took so long to answer this, im not really good at explaining these things but im going to try! ill put it all under the cut:)

(the gif set in question)

To preface, I make gifs in Photoshop!

okay, so basically my best friend when it comes to color correcting scenes is the Channel Mixer tool. I'm sure there are other ways to do it, but after a lot of experimenting I've found this method to work the best for me.

The way the CM tool works is kinda hard to explain, esp because I only figured out how to use it through trial and error, but essentially it breaks your canvas (gif) down into 3 primary colors: Red, Green, and Blue. Each color will have 3 channels: the primary channel (for blue it's blue, red is red, and green is green) and two secondary channels for the other two colors. The primary channel will always default to +100, and the secondary channels will default at 0.

Using the tool, you can adjust each color's channels to add more or less of a certain color to the existing colors in your scene. For example, you can add more blue to the greens and reds on your canvas, or more red to the blues and greens, etc. In my experience, you will not need to adjust the Green settings very often other than for very minor adjustments to complement the other channels. It requires somewhat of a preexisting understanding of color theory (what combinations of colors will create what end result, what too much of one color will look like and what color will balance it, etc), but it's not too hard to figure out, especially if you play around with it and experiment with what each channel does and how it affects each gif.

The main goal of using the Channel Mixer for correction is to adjust the coloring of a scene to be as neutral as possible, and then to edit from there.

So with this particular gif set, the lighting was very yellow tinted. When using CM, yellow is a color that's grouped into the red family. So when you have a scene that is yellow-washed, you want to push more blue into it to start balancing it out.

Here is the original:

Now, like I said, we need to add some blue. In the Blue settings, I adjusted the channels to the following: Green +14, Red +14, Blue +100 (default). When using CM, small adjustments go a long way. Here is what our gif looks like now:

As you can see, it's less yellow tinted, but now it's a little rose colored. To fix that, we will go into the Red settings and lower the primary channel to +75. Here is the result:

The scene is still very dark and unsaturated, but the coloring is much more neutral now and will make editing much easier. After getting the gif to this point, I added a few more adjustment layers: Levels, Curves, Brightness/Contrast, and made some slight adjustments with Hue/Saturation and Selective color. Here is the final result (this is before sharpening):

For comparison:

I hope this makes sense! Feel free to let me know if you have any questions!

[softgrungeprophet]

thinking out loud about art process/medium

pros of tablet (screenless):

-no art supply costs after initial cost (in my case it was like 80 bucks cause i use an old bamboo pen&touch)

-hand doesn't get in the way of seeing

-1 physical tool for everything (pen)

-can resize, undo, erase ink, and very importantly use bucket tool

-coloring is easier (see bucket tool)

-hotkeys (ctrl-z....)

-no need for scanner, digital only takes up less physical space

-pattern brushes! 3d models! assets!

- rulers, grids, snapping etc. shift for straight line, line tools

-change colors easily

-choose canvas size arbitrarily and at any resolution i want, plus cropping and cutting, copying, pasting etc.

-screen doesn't need a light on to see (at least not these days lol)

-text tool

-some tablets come with free software bundles (mine came with photoshop and corel, though not the new ones lol)

-if tablet is durable, may be cheaper in the long run (my first lasted about 5 years? i think? only busted because cable got damaged; current one is still fine)

-weird filters and effects, blur, etc.

-bitches love layers (i'm bitches)

-i can resize shit when i inevitably fuck up proportions

cons:

-upfront cost is expensive if it breaks (tho there are more cheap options on the market now)

-less intuitive for my brain-to-hand connection and coordination personally... harder for me to recreate lines digitally --always impressed by people who can follow their sketch precisely cause it's literally impossible for me 😂 i've gotten better at the intuitive stuff since i first started 10 yrs ago but it's still always a liiiittle awkward haha... but tbh this is still true for traditional to a lesser extent

-i get tangled in my cables a lot 😂

-digital storage on pc only, have to have printer for physical copies and colors can come out weird since i draw in rgb lol, risk of deletion or file loss or corruption

-using refs can get cluttered on only one monitor

-handwriting becomes even more illegible and calligraphy pens are kinda meh (at least defaults are)

-hand hurty because cramped space

-future...? longevity not any clearer than physical media tbh. might last forever or might be gone in an instant, even before considering future of technology... shrug! lol

-screen colors and brightness?! girl help my art looks different on every device i own 😂

-if you forget to save it's gone (luckily i save compulsively)

-csp text tool kind of mediocre tbh

-companies want you to buy new programs, stop supporting old ones, charge subscriptions, etc etc etc....

pros of traditional art:

-tactility and naturalness of hand on paper makes lineart and stuff a little easier--i'm still not very coordinated though so i still have issues with this regardless of medium...

-can look at reference on screen separate instead of swapping between tabs or cramming on one screen or canvas (physical references like books or objects make this moot for either medium tbf)

-medium experimentation easier than digital in that it lets you feel the different textures and behaviors in a way that's less functional digitally (tho there are some great brush sets) and more tactile or even potential 3-dimensional (ie thick layers of oil paint or mixed media painting with sculptural techniques)

- handwriting is (marginally) more legible...

-physical object, already exists, cannot be deleted (but ...)

-color not completely dependent on screen (but can still be affected by lighting or fading, in fairness)

-i like doodling with ballpoint pens (i do all my thumbnails with bic pens and yellow legal pads or sketchbooks lol)

-if you don't save, nothing happens because it's just an object you made irl lol there's nothing to save; it exists (see physical object)

-no cables

-no download or program (or subscription) required (not that i use Photoshop except the free copy that came with my tablet but it's relevant as a digital artist)

cons:

-buy new art supplies constantly cause stuff runs out; markers are expensive (though ink refills in long run less expensive than buying new markers, still needs frequent replacement for certain colors such as skin tones, still adddds up)

-have to buy or otherwise acquire everything separately, can't experiment in different mediums without buying more stuff... different paper.... different pen types... ink types.... etc. and then if you don't like it or use it, it's like.... ok i'm out $20 (or more)

-hand is always in the way! ahh!

-no undo or any of that and no saving copies unless manually tracing or you scan it first

-if you are bad at letter placement you can't move or resize 😂 i def have trouble with this sometimes lol

-i don't like coloring in traditional mediums and filling large inks is time consuming and generally unpleasant... alcohol markers are better but i am just not a colorist at the end of the day... obviously other people like it more (i enjoy abstract watercolor though)

-can't change colors after the fact... (probably good to swatch huh)

-erase erase erase ugh i hate erasing...

-can't hide layers or group together cause it's all one layer (at least, in practice. i'm sure it's technically scientifically in layers of ink, paint etc.)

-white gel pens never work 😂 and i can't do large areas of white on top unless I'm using opaque paint (not always feasible) (maybe i should have become a painter, huh)

-shitty or cheap materials feel tangibly worse to use; also my inking pen of choice is microns and similar felt tip technical pens, and they can feel unpleasant on a lot of paper types, plus fast lines are harder to do without skipping and scratching, and larger nibs often aren't very good tbh (maybe my pens are just cheap?)

-have to manually measure out frames, panels, borders, use physical ruler for straight lines, often with pen bleed if you do it wrong....

-doesn't have any of those easy assets, models, pattern brushes etc. (well, partially; they do make stuff like screentone, manga background assets, and you can do collage in theory or trace stuff if you have a lightbox)

-messy or smelly depending on what you use (paint pens, alcohol markers etc), sometimes requires extra ventilation or working outside for safety (tho really at that point you probably wouldn't be using a technique that works digitally anyway so i guess it's an inevitability lol)

-some materials take longer to dry than others, need protective coating or are not archival/will fade

-physical object, requires scanning and editing (esp to make copies), takes up space, can be destroyed or lost (not so different from digital in that regard) also takes up more physical space to store lots of drawing or paintings, art supplies, etc.

-requires working space especially if you work larger or are using lots of colors etc.

-needs light (... usually. i did make a painting in the dark once but that's usually not practical lol)

-cannot type on drawing (well. you CAN but it's less straightforward than clicking a text tool)

-hand still hurty

-no resizing! have to live with fucked up proportions 💀 (i'm working on it)

no point to this just thinking about things i like and dislike about both ways of creating

when it comes to writing i will take typing over handwriting any day though

[kangyeosaang]

how to pan gifs

were u ever like gahd these camerapeople again making yet another stage ungiffable. yeah me too.

sooo here in this tutorial i'm gonna try to explain how to pan gifs so ur subject can remain centered or at least not be out of frame, sth like this:

this is a more advanced tutorial, in a sense that i'll assume you know how to make gifs, not in a sense that this is complicated lmao, okay let's gooo:

essentially this is what's happening and what we gonna do:

before we dive into the how tho, it must be said that photoshop's timeline can only do linear movements so no easing. at times it can look unnatural or choppy or... frankly both. (if you want to know more about this look up ease-in-out animation curve, or easing curves)

part 01 · prepping gifs

as i wrote in my gif making process post i usually crop my gifs bigger than they usually will be. e.g. a 268px gif will be cropped to anything between 468-540px. sometimes because i want to have the opportunity to position the gif a bit differently but most of the time because i know 268px is a reeeaaalllyyy tight place and i need to make some movement adjustments especially for weekend music shows where the camerapeople seem to be on crack or just very into experimenting

part 02 · let the keyframe madness begin

whichever way you are making gifs just open up your gif and crop it to the final size, colour it and whatever else you fancy. once you have everything ready just open your video layer on your timeline (if you don't know where you will be able to see it in the video later)

you will see 3 tracks, transform, opacity and style. for this we will use the transform because it contains movements (but also resizing if that's what you fancy).

all we need to do is create keyframes which will define what is the position of the video layer at a certain time. so e.g. here we are moving this box to the right by 50px in 1 second.

to create keyframes click on the timer icon in front of the position label and photoshop will create you one. the active one will always be yellow. if you move on the timeline with your playhead (that thing that is moving) and you resize/move your layer photoshop will create yet another keyframe for you without you needing to click on it, because it will recognise the change. so all you need to figure out is when the movement starts and which position your layer should be, and the same for the end and ps will take care of the rest.

part 03 · some things to consider when panning gifs

now this is the part where it gets subjective and less tutorial like. so all i can provide is some explanation how i go about it and what i pay attention to.

tip #1: match the movement speed to the gif

whenever you are panning a gif it may result in the gif being choppy bc the framerate and your movements are not matching up, so it's either too fast and photoshop needs to move your image by too many pixels frame by frame or it's too slow resulting in basically the same thing but kinda reversed, either way it won't look smooth. this mostly happens when the original footage is moving (there is a quick camera pan/movement) and you are trying to keep it in place, less when the original is kinda still and the subject is moving. this is kind of a trial and error process: try moving your keyframes closer to each other or maybe further, add more/less movement between two keyframes and just see which results in a smoother gif.

tip #2: try moving your gif once in one direction

there are times when your subject might go out of frame multiple times and you have the urge to keyframe the whole gif and keep them in center the whole time. however, as we do not have easing curves in photoshop the switch between moving something from one direction to the other one will be very visible. so try placing your subject in a way that you'll only need to make one movement and it's kinda okay all the way thru or pick the most annoying 'placement' you want to correct. here in this example it mostly bugged me that the gif was not centered at the end, but onda kinda remained in frame.

tip #3: pan your gifs when there is a quick zoom/movement

sometimes whatever i do the gif will look choppy regardless one movement or not. in these moments, and these moments ONLY we can be thankful for the sometimes unnecessary zooming that's happening and reposition our gifs while the zooming is happening. since there is already a drastic movement you can get away with basically anything, as long as you time the beginning and the end where the zoom begins and ends. also i must add that you can pan stage gifs way more and more drastically bc there is a lot of things happening in the background, so adding a bit of movement on top of all the other movements is less noticeable than... moving footage where e.g. the background is static.

✨something extra✨ · panning/moving other things

so what we looked at is moving the whole gif to fit into the frame we have, but with this technique obviously you can move all sorts of stuff, text, texture whatever you fancy. you can apply this process to the layer you wanna move and this is when you get these:

a sidenote: the fade effect is literally the same keyframe business but instead of playing with position keyframes you change the opacity keyframes.

aaand that is all, if you have any questions my askbox is always open so hmu <3

tagging @sanhwalynight bc of requesting reasons hehe

[riickgrimes]

Ok, so I didn't save the psd for that, but I remade one very similar to it.

For this tutorial, you just need any photoshop and basic gifmaking skills!

(p.s. sorry if it's a bit wordy... )

To start, pls do not feel in any way compelled to color exactly as I do. If you have your own way of coloring that works for you and you just want to pick and choose what parts of this to add to your technique, that is 1000% fine. This tutorial is kind of personalized to me and the process I use to color and what makes sense to me. Ok, spiel over...

So here's the original gif, sharpened with no psd

STEP 1: Exposure 1

First, I added an Exposure layer to brighten things up. 

GIF:

STEP 2: Curves

With this Ccurves layer I like to do a bit of color correcting by adjusting the individual RGB curves. Because this scene is so blue/cyan, I made sure to bring out the reds in the highlights by pulling the small box in the top right corner of the red curves directly to the left, same with the green curves.

I moved the box on blue curves only a little since the scene is already so blue. I made sure to move the small box in the bottom left corner to the right to add some yellow in the shadows to counteract how blue the scene is.

(I dragged the curve down a little bit because the gif was a little too red for my taste. Dragging it down puts some cyan in the shadows.)

GIF:

STEP 3: Exposure 2

I added another Exposure layer to brighten things up more. This time, I moved the Gamma Correction slider to the right to add more contrast. With this layer, the difference is slight, but it is effective.

*** I don’t normally start with an Exposure layer or even use 2 Exposure layers for that matter (usually just one after my curves layer), I only started doing this while making gifs for these darks scenes in Stranger Things. Idk how well this specific process works for dark scenes in other shows/movies***

GIF:

STEP 4: Selective Color

I used this layer to add some more yellows to the gif and add some contrast. I like to make my gif almost too yellow and then fix it later with Color Balance.

GIF:

STEP 5: Color Balance 1

For the first Color Balance layer, I like to place it beneath all of my other layers. To me, it kinda makes the effect “richer” in a way, idk how exactly to explain it. But I’ve been doing it this way for years and it works for me.

GIF:

STEP 6: Levels

Now this Levels layer goes back to where we left off above the Selective Colors layer.

GIF:

STEP 7: Gradient Map

I used a black and white gradient map and set it to Soft Light with the opacity at 20%. 

A gradient map may seem counterproductive since it deepens the shadows and darkens the gif, but I like the contrast that it gives.

GIF:

STEP 8: Vibrance

Ok, so this one is more or less optional. It makes very little difference, but I like a lil vibrance, as a treat.

GIF:

STEP 9: Color Balance 2

This Color Balance layer is really just used for any additional color correcting that may be necessary.

GIF:

STEP 10: Adjust Curves layer

Now that we have the coloring/color correction mostly done, I can finally decide just how much more I want to brighten my gif. I go back to my Curves layer and add a curve somewhere in the upper right corner, just to where it looks bright enough to my liking. I’ll then pull down the curve in the lower left corner to deepen the darks and add some more contrast.

GIF:

STEP 11: Brightness/Contrast

For the final step, I add a Brightness/Contrast layer because I didn’t think adjusting the Curves layer brightened the gif enough. I added this layer directly above the Curves layer and below the 2nd Exposure layer.

GIF:

Here’s the finished product:

and here’s a quick before and after:

I know there are a lot of tiny adjustments, but as I was explaining to the anon who originally asked the question, I like to build upon the layers. I don’t try to solve every problem in one layer. I don’t try to make the gif bright enough with just one curves or brightness or levels layer. I make a lot of little adjustments that, in the end, make a large difference. 

Also don’t feel as though you have to get the adjustments exactly right when you first add the layer, especially with a dark scene like this where it’s hard to see how much of something you need. I had to go back and add more in the color balance layers or lessen the levels or adjust the RGB in the curves multiple times before I felt that the coloring was to my liking.

I hoped this helped. If you’d like the psd, pls message me bc tumblr won’t let me add links. 

Do not hesitate to ask me any questions!

[capricorn-0mnikorn]

Hey, I don't intend to come of as rude in any way through this message, but I'd just like to provide a little bit of feedback towards your disability pride flag redesign? While I do consider it an improvement over the original, and I don't actively dislike it or anything, the newer design has this sort of weird brightness to it that gives me a headache when I look at it. I don't know if that's just me, but I thought letting you know would be sorta helpful if others are experiencing the same thing. It sorta looks like there's like a photo filter overlaying the top of it and it kinda makes it hard to look at, at least for me. Again, I don't wanna come off as rude, and you definitely don't need to take my comment to consideration or anything! Hope you have a nice day!

Nah, Nonny, Don't worry. It's cool. I was planning on making a post about this very issue today, anyway. So this is a good prompt.

It sorta looks like there's like a photo filter overlaying the top of it and it kinda makes it hard to look at, at least for me.

It’s not just you. I’ve seen a few people mention this, especially since yesterday afternoon. And I think there may be a few reasons that (I hope) are relatively easy to fix with some tweaks.

In somewhat chronological order, not necessarily importance or magnitude:

1) I created my first flag image in the most basic. lo-res, app there is: MS Paint (It’s what I’ve got, and trying to learn PhotoShop clones makes my head spin), so that may create the “bad filter” effect.

2) When I was redesigning the flag, last year, I fiddled with the luminosity settings for each of colors, so that even in pure grey scale, the stripes would be distinct (so color perception is less of an issue for the flag’s “readability”, for all the different variations of color blindness out there). And I think I made the red and yellow too close to each other.

This is what it looks like in pure grey scale:

The luminosity scale goes from 0 for pure black to 240 for pure white, and the values I’ve got here are:

“Black” = 88 “Red” = 151 “Yellow” = 168 “White” = 219 “Blue” = 163 “Green” = 109

(I tried darkening the red to the same level as the green... and let’s just say I got “Children’s hospital” vibes; color theory is hard)

3) I suspect a lot of people who are sharing the image (especially in the last day or two) are copying and pasting that original, giving the original lo-res image even more distortion.

So I am now making a public request:

If you’re someone with good graphics software on your machine, please promote this flag by creating new images of it, and also experimenting with the luminosity values (keeping in mind not to make the contrast between the stripes too strong). If we keep working together and sharing what we do, we can keep making this better and better.

That’s why I put this flag in the public domain:

Just as Disability is a culture that anyone can join at any time, this flag should belong to all of us.

[castawavy]

Hi! This is probably a weird question but how do you shoot night time scenes for your story? I always have a hard time getting good lighting

gah night time is so hard anon I feel ur pain!!! I usally try to avoid it if I can but sometimes I have to shoot at night but the editing for night/ dark pictures always takes me longer! I'll explain under a cut!

(1) for this scene I basically started by deepening the contrast kinda with the 'curves' tool in photoshop. I always do this step first. I also inceased the brightness and upped the contrast on top of that to stop luna fading with the background. Once I was happy that she didn't blend so much (2) I then made an overlay layer and took like a light but really rich yellow kinda colour:

this gradient tool is my absolute favourite I use it for everything. I put it at 20% opacity and select radial gradiant (top menu) and I go and drag it across the areas where theres light. I also did this on Luna's face to imply there was a light source across from her (all of this is still on the overlay layer btw).

But it helps her to stand out even more in the foreground. (4) Lastly I make another overlay layer, and kind of outline around her with that same or an even brighter yellow colour:

Again to make her stand out but also to maybe kinda suggest that the light behind her is lighting her up from that side too (idk for me I feel it just completes the look)!

It's like in this scene I use four lights to brighten with overlay: 1. the window which I use a warm colour for to match the light. Then 2. the fading sky, I brightened this a little because in the summer time idk if you've noticed but sometimes u can still see the like glow of the sun really late in the evening :O then 3. the outlines and light reflecting on Luna's face (also draws attention to her expression... brow, chin etc.) and 4. those tiny streetlights I super brighten in the background to make it more obscure looking/define the shapes less!

But yeah basically you want to avoid shooting in complete darkness if you can help it! There's always gonna be moonlight if you're outdoors and if ur sim IS in pitch darkness somewhere even then you can raise the brightness and a little and play around with curves and contrast to make sure your sim doesnt get lost in the background!

Anyways sorry that ws a little long winded, I hope it at least made sense? 😭👉👈 if it didn't please don't be afraid to ask me to elaborate or explain something properly!! 💖

[hallucinosims]

hey bestie quick question how the FUCK did you make that hallway look like it goes on forever please and thank you

Firstly this is the only way i will ever accept small tutorial/explanation requests from now on secondly it's actually easier than you'd think, bestie. This can be done in pretty much any editing program that you can layer in but i will be using photoshop 2021 (because adobe updated without me knowing) but that's besides the point

{Tutorial under the read more}

Alright step one: Make your hallway

Still kinda long, but nothing dramatic as this was done on a small lot in a basement...but i digress. When adding lights make sure the farther the light is from the "camera" the darker you have the light set too. Like in mine the first light is about half of warm white, and after that it is a third, then a quarter, then a little bit higher than nothing, while the last one is off. Add doors to get some more depth, and space them out a little better than i did if you want the door vibe. But if not, then just make a long and narrow hallway and [IMPORTANT] Make sure you get a SOLID V SHAPE FOR THE CIELING AND FLOOR! This is what makes it feel like it goes on and on and on...

Step two: Take it into your editing app of choice and make it a layer.

Then duplicate that layer 2 or more times. With each layer, make the picture smaller and smaller. Make a very solid effort to line up the Vs of the ceiling and floor (but if the floor doesn't quite line up then just focus on the cieling as that will be what really sells it)

In this example, i had 5 layers. You can see where the next picture begins by the banding of the lights. You can kinda see what I meant about the floor thing hear

Step three: BLEND FOR YOUR LIFE

This part involves a LOT of erasing and little spots of correction as you go. Focus on blending the walls the most. Although the cieling and the center point are what really sells it, the whole wall give it away because that's what makes if very obvious that this is just a screenshot you made gradually smaller and smaller. What i've done in mine, because i like making things easier on myself, was i just copied one side and mirrored it with the other. And for the floor i just copied the bit with the smooth lines and made them bigger.

Now you're probably looking at this and thinking "Hey bestie...that looks a bit crap still" And you'd be right because i'm rushing and also have like 5 more steps HOWEVER if you're keeping the hallway fairly well lit then this would be your final step and you'd clean all the obvious flaws way more. But to me the fun part is always the mood lighting

Step four: LIGHTING

Merge your layers together (If you trust yourself like that. If not then merge everything into a folder if possible and do everything else I'm about to say on adjustment layers.

4a: Brightness and contrast make it a bit more moody and darker so the flaws become a little less noticeable. After this i also used curves to make it a little darker and the red richer. But that was more of a me thing than a necessity so i didn't capture that part

4b. Now make a new layer and go HAM on the shadows with a soft brush with zero hardness. Imagine an X where it is the darkest where the cieling and floor Vs connect while the ones along the wall are a little lighter. After make that X go into Filter > Blur Gallery > Field blur and mess with the settings of the shadow layer until you feel its as harsh/soft as you want your shadows to be, I personally went for 103 while my shadow layer was at 83% opacity

Before blurring

After blurring

She a little smoother now and is coming along nicely YOU'RE PRETTY MUCH DONE!

4c. High lights! Follow the lines of where the little lights are and blast them with some light yellows or full white depending on how heavy you want the lighting to look IN A NEW LAYER. Once you're done with that layer, change your normal setting to overlay and blur it to your hearts content as stated with the shadows. You usually won't need to blue highlights as much as you need to blur out shadows. For example I only blurred mine to a 25 px for the lights as opposed to the 103 for the shadows

Highlights in normal layer

Highlights in overlay and blurred

Step 5: The final touch, Depth of field

To get the deep look for this i'd reccomend going into blur gallery one more time and creating a t with your blur points and each 2 less than the last. For example, in my the center point was 6 px blurred. The four points around that were 4, then 2, and then 0

And YOU ARE ALL SET! After all of that your deep and spooky hallway is complete! Now go forth and cause chaos, bestie

[arabian-batboy]

in your post about things you would change about the Batfamily post you said you would give Tim a new costume and I was wondering how you feel about the rest of the Batfamily current costumes and if there's anything you would change? (I personally hate Jason current costume)

The one with the restraint mask and red eyes? God I hate that costume too, especially because Jason already had the coolest costume in the Batfam before that.

With Bruce, Dick and Jason I’m a strong believer of “if it isn’t broke, don’t fix it,” their classic costumes are just fine. I don’t want to see them in anything except the black and blue bodysuit with the Nightwing symbol, the brown leather jacket of Redhood (with NO helmet-lips plz) and a good old all-black Batsuit (without a speedo or round yellow Batsignal symbol) for Batman.

Recently with Barbara they have made the black part of her Batgirl be this shade of blue/purple? While her cape/gloves/boots got shorter? Altogether it just feels like they wanted a more “cutiefied” and casual look for her, which I’m not here for, I would much prefer it if she had a pitch-black suit with yellow gloves up her elbows and yellow boots up to her knees, something like this. (but then again I would rather Babs be Oracle instead of Batgirl, so I don’t really care)

I like both Stephanie’s Spoiler’s outfit and Batgirl’s outfit, but I may prefer the Spoiler one because I think we need some variety in costumes and there’s too much black clothes in the family. My only complaint is that I wish they gave her a Bat-symbol on her chest or something to make her outfit less plain, also just make her face-mask cover only half her face instead of all of it.

I also like Cassandra’s Orphan costume, but I would prefer it if she went back to her creepy-smiley-face Batgirl outfit, but without a cape (capes just don’t suit Cass) and I would really like it if they went crazy with the stitching part of her costume by extending it all over her costume for max creepiness. Basically a mix between her current costume and Catwoman’s costume from the 92′s Batman Returns movie.

Like I said in my “things I would do if I was in charge of DC” I would destroy nostalgic Tim’s fans who don’t want to let go of the 90′s by giving Tim a brand new Superhero identity and costume, so he can finally leave the Robin’s role completely behind him. I don’t know how I want it to look like though, I just want it to be capeless (I would like to believe that it’s a tradition for every Batboy to go capeless after they stop being Robin) also I wouldn’t mind if his costume had a new color not used by anyone in the Batfam, maybe orange?

With Damian, I may like his version of the Robin’s outfit the most, but I feel that recently they have been over-exaggerating how long his tunic and cape are, I much prefer his pre-Rebirth Robin’s costume, but I guess sometime change is good? If that’s the case then I would love it if they gave his costume a more Arabic feel and maybe make Damian have a Tim-dropping-the-green-part-of-his-Robin-costume moment, but instead he drops the red part and goes with green and yellow instead, I did photoshop his costume to look like that if you’re interested.

And Lastly Duke, at the beginning I didn’t like how they gave him a yellow costume because I associated that color too much with Babs, but over time I got over it, although I still think his costume is still too “Power Ranger-y” if that makes sense? I think it has something to do with helmet, so I think it would be for the best if they gave him a domino mask and a hoodie instead. (but honestly I’m kinda neutral about his current costume, so I wouldn’t be mind if they just gave him a new one instead)

[mikeshanlon]

psst share your outer banks coloring secrets

ah, yes, one of the worst shows to color lmaoooo. i'll try to give some tips but im sure as anyone who has tried to color this show knows each scene is diff and has it's own flavor of awful yellow/green/red shading.

some tips on how to go from this to this......

............under the cut! (warning v long and idk if i'm the best at explaining things lmao)

so firstly, i use this psd i made ages ago for everything (alecbaenes was my url many moons ago i just am too lazy to change and reupload). usually i will go into each individual layer of that psd and see how they work with the scene, and will change the opacity or turn off the layer depending on what looks best. generally for obx, i will lower the opacity on the gradient map layer, as well as certain vibrancy/curves/levels layers, ones that make the gif brighter and more vibrant. i will usually bring back some vibrancy and brightness later but when im first getting the base coloring, some layers just heighten the yellow/red and we need to kinda bring that down before we make adjustments to get aspects like skin color more accurate.

so, just with my psd/adjustments made to the psd layers, the gif may looks something like this: (going to use this gif bc i made it more recently so i remember some of the stuff i did better, and is the most accurate to my current process--plus it sucks to color lmao)

ususally still way to red/yellow for my liking, both for the skin tones and to be able to manipulate the colors for a vibrant coloring! so the next step is to get colors as close to how they are normally. warning, you will have to make 345435354 adjustment layers and just keep tweaking and tweaking... and tweaking. sometimes i will have like 20+ adjustment layers at the end of the process. i usually put all my adjustments under my psd--i also always add a vibrance and brightness layer above. sometimes it helps to do final tweaks above the psd if you just cant get anything right bc of course the psd will change how colors normally look.

anyways, usually my base fixes will be some sort of combination of curves, levels, color balance, and selective color. so like, if the gif needs more depth/darkness, or is way too bright, i will bring the curve down or up respectively. levels, and also increasing the black selective color layer will also add depth. i will also use auto curve sometimes! the first image i have below i circled some of the extra tools i may use--auto for auto curves, the top black eyedropper you select the darker points in your gif and it will adjust based on that, the bottom one for the lightest--if i use those i will either use the black one only, or the black and then the white. the other three are examples of how my curve layers may look--i already have S curves in my psd, so when i do extra curve adjustments, it's just one single point, and i don't move it that much. same with levels, i dont make a super dramatic change, when it's under the psd it's enough to just move a bit to make a big difference. sometimes i'll also bring these layers to a lower opacity.

generally my first step is color balance though, especially if the gif seems mostly fine lighting wise. for obx, i usually shift it towards cyan and blue to cancel out the red tones. magenta and green depends, if its more green i may move towards magenta and vice versa, but usually i dont shift it that dramatically and often leave it alone. i will usually move the bottom bar towards blue, to soften the yellow tones. color balance helps shift the overall colors of the gif. notice that it's on mid tones in these pictures:

as you can see, i shift the cyan/red one more dramatically than the yellow/blue, and with magenta and green i usually just move it 1-3 points over. in the last one, i actually shifted towards red above my psd layer, because after all my adjustments i lost some of the red/warmth, so i brought back in red.

with color balance/curves, the gif may looks something like this

less of a completely red/yellow filter over everything! but still not great, their skin is too red, and overall still not the best base to try colorings. so next up is selective color, which can really help you fine tune things, but because of that.... SUUUUPER tedious. i will have 3495874 selective color layers and sometimes like 5 of them will be half canceling each other out just to get something okay. but this is a hobby i've chosen so we must suffer LKRGJRG. generally, my realm revolves around red, yellow, and at times magenta or neutral. if you think back to how we fixed some of the colors with color balance, kind of a similar principle, just with the individual colors. and lots of experimenting. so with color balance i would cancel out reds by making them more cyan--on the red selective color, im also gonna turn up the cyan. for yellow, i'm gonna make it more magenta, to make the yellow tones warmer. i will tweak the other tones too, just kinda experiment to see how changing it affects the gif, and then soon you will kind of intuitively know how to change the values based on whats going on in the gif lighting. magenta selective color helps for red values that are more pink, so make them more red or yellow based on what you need--i don't use this as much, hence i didnt have an example in the crop of psds i opened, but it's helpful sometimes. with neutral selective color, it usually affects the whole gif, so again, only minimal changes--usually i will bring the black levels down if it got to bright, or add just a tinge or yellow or cyan or whatever i need. here's some pics to show examples of what mine looked like for this gif:

there were many more, but i just chose a few. the '1' and '2' i wrote to demonstrate that these layers were sequential, how they balance each other, and how selective color can be a tedious balancing act-- the second example it's like basically the opposite but it balances it out. also, if you have two characters with different skin tones, or the lighting is different for them, etc, you can use layer masks to erase certain adjustments so it only affects one of the subjects. some of these tweaks will be inbetween me transforming the gif to be colorful, and noticing how the colors interact, etc. so between this i was also making it colorful and it's not exactly the finished product at this stage: but this is kind of what the gif would look like after all the adjustments just to get it looking... normalish:

not totally perfect but MUCH better, and also will look a little different when surrounded by the colors i want to turn it into. i have some stuff about how i color in this tag, i can do a lil other tutorial or smth if needed but bc i have limited photo space on the ask and already wrote so much i wont get super into it here. but for shows like obx, it helps to work with a group of colors that will work with the show--yellows/oranges are easier bc of all the yellow already found in the show. pinks can be harder because there is so much yellow in the show, but doable. greens are good because of all the green in the show, and thus blues are good because its easy to go from green to blue with selective color and stuff. thus, purples are good too because its easy to go from blue to purple! stuff like that makes it easier. some work with selective color, hue and saturation, gradients, and voila!

you can see how maybe some of the issues like it being still a little too yellow/greeny toned balances out with the surrounding colors.

also, a big part of it is just practice! i've been giffing for yeaaaaaars and with media that has just the most god awful lighting so i've gotten good at understanding what to do and sometimes i'm just on auto pilot.

hopefully that helped, i know it was long winded and it can be hard to explain/understand photoshop. if y'all want some more in depth explanation about a part of the process i can try, or with other examples!

[kadywicker]

detailed giffing + basic coloring tutorial for beginners

so a lot of gif/coloring tutorials are pretty outdated or not that detailed & i wanted to put my own out there! in this:

how to get the screencaps for your gifs

how to make a general gif

basic coloring (no psds here, it just gives you a basic idea for making colors pop and look nice. you can look up how to use psds, but i prefer making my own for every gif as it’s much more personal, gratifying, and creative. there’s nothing wrong with using psds as long as you don’t claim them as your own, it’s just not my personal thing)

how to save a gif

we’ll be going from this:

to this

what you need:

photoshop (cc 2019 is what i’m using, but this works with any version of photoshop really as long as you download a version with the timeline feature) i won’t add download links here since i don’t want this deleted, but you can look some up on tumblr or use the pirate bay (current url is pirateproxy.blue as of 4/29/2020) & follow the instructions there.

for windows: potplayer/kmplayer (both use literally the exact same instructions) this tutorial uses potplayer but kmplayer uses like literally the same instructions, it just doesnt work right on my computer

for mac: mplayer. this tutorial does NOT cover this so find a tutorial on tumblr on how to take screencaps with mplayer & then skip to the “how to make a general gif” section. though, again, i’m on a pc so i have no idea if this is entirely accurate for mac.

if you’re downloading from youtube: clipconverter 

if you’re Definitely Legaly torrenting: utorrent + the pirate bay (again, current url is pirateproxy.blue as of 4/29/2020) or another torrent site + you should really consider getting a VPN when torrenting (i use privateinternetaccess but you can find one that suits you)

note: download an adblock of some kind, disable automatic downloads on your computer, & download an antivirus program if you want because some sites are sketchier than others! this is ESPECIALLY crucial on sites like piratebay. keep your computer safe babes.

1. screencapping

there’s several ways to get screencaps on photoshop, but this is the easiest imo and i’ve never done the whole convert video frames to layers thing. like i said, you’ll need potplayer or kmplayer. i’m using potplayer. important note: don’t accidentally download viruses here! read each screen carefully & make sure you’re not hitting accept to download any secondary programs.

1. download your .mp4/.mkv. you can go to youtube & find a clip/scene/whatever and use clipconverter to download it. just make sure you download it at 720 (or higher) as anything lower than that will give you a poor quality gif. you can also download using somewhere like the pirate bay, but for this you need utorrent & i would HIGHLY recommend using a vpn if you live in a country where torrenting copyrighted content is illegal, as your internet provider may flag your ip address if you don’t & you torrent too often.  

2. download potplayer/kmplayer & get it set up

3. create a screencaps folder. i always put mine on my desktop. in your screencaps folder, make a folder for however many gifs you want in your set. i just have one for mine so:

4. open up your .mp4/.mkv

5. hit ctrl + g to bring up the screen capture pop-up & set your settings to these. click the button w/the three dots next to the storage option & select the folder you created for your first gif

6. navigate to the scene you want to gif. when you’re there, pause it and hit the start button on the consecutive image capture screen, then play the video. how many screencaps you need depends on the size of your gif. for larger gifs (so like 540px wide gifs), you’re probably going to want to keep it below 30 frames. for smaller gifs (268px wide or less) you can maybe stretch it to 60, depending on how much coloring you add. you can always delete screencaps later though in photoshop, so don’t worry about it too much. for this gif, i only had 17 frames because the scene was really short lmao

7. go to your screencap folder you made & delete any unnecessary frames. it’ll look like this:

8. repeat the process for any other gifs, making new folders in your “screencaps” folder, numbered for however many gifs you’re making. make sure to change the folder you’re loading the images into on the image capture pop up though so they don’t all go into folder 1. 

2. making a simple gif (+sharpening)

1. first, you need to load your screencaps. when you open up photoshop, go to file > scripts > load files into stack

2. when the window pops up, switch the “file” option to “folder”

3. click browse and find your screencap folder for your first gif (in my case, desktop > screencaps > 1) once it’s all loaded, click “OK”

4. it’ll take a minute to load all your screencaps into photoshop. when they do, go to the upper bar on photoshop > windows > timeline

5. when the timeline bar shows up, click “create frame animation”

6. hit this button and click “make frames from layers”

7. hit the button again and click “reverse frames”

8. click back onto your first gif. then select the rectangular marquee tool and set it to whatever gif size you want. the width for 2 small gifs next to each other is 268px, the width for full size gifs is 540px. most people use 268x150 px for gifsets of 4+

9. use the marquee tool to select what area you want for your gif, like this. it’s up to you how to crop it! get creative!

10. go to image > crop

11. now that your image is cropped, go to image > image size. change the size to your desired gif size (in this case 268x150). hit “OK”. then make sure it’s zoomed in to 100%

12. now, you COULD just save this gif, but they look way better sharpened. so you need to convert this to a smart object. to do so, first select all your layers in the righthand layer window. to select all the layers, click on your top layer, hold shift, and scroll down to your bottom layer & click on it as well while still holding shift

13. next, you need to select all your frames. go back to the options button from part 6 > select all frames

14. next, we’re going to create an action to make your life 100x easier when it comes to sharpening gifs in the future. to do so, go to the actions icon (may look different on different versions of photoshop, but basically just find the actions window)

15. create a new action with this button. name it something. i named this one “sharpen tutorial” and hit “record”

16. click this button to convert to video timeline

17. go to filter > convert for smart objects

18. go to your single created layer and right click and click duplicate layer. this helps get rid of the transparent border around the gif.

19. go to filter > sharpen > smart sharpen & use these settings

20. go to filter > blur > gaussian blur. set it to these settings.

21. go to your second layer with the filters on it & right click on the gaussian blur filter to select “edit smart filter blending options” and set the opacity to 50%. you can mess around with this for different levels of sharpness. the closer to 0%, the sharper your gif will be.

22. hit the stop recording button on your sharpen action. now you’ll have an action to use next time you make a gif! after you’ve followed all the steps 1-13 you simply go to actions, click on your saved sharpening action, and hit play instead & it’ll do steps 14-21 in a few seconds. here’s a pic of the stop button on the actions window

23. our gif is now sharpened! you can end with this & skip to the saving a gif section, or you can continue to coloring. here’s what we have so far.

3. coloring

now on to coloring. this is pretty basic coloring and it probably won’t work if you follow my numbers exactly, as every single scene is different color + lighting wise. but this is just an example of the kind of thing you could do. basically, if you’re making vibrant gifs, you want to up the brightness + contrast + vibrance and make the colors already present pop. if you want anything more complicated (pale gifs, changing the colors to make, say, quentin’s shirt in these gifs red instead of blue), you’ll have to find other tutorials or experiment on your own. learning how to color & finding your style takes time! you can download psds if you want, but imo those kinda take the fun out of making gifs? that’s just me though. 

after each step, i’ll show you what the gif looks like.

1. i usually start with a curves layer. i usually don’t mess with the color curve options, just this one:

2. next, i do a brightness/contrast layer

3. next, i do a vibrance layer. make sure not to make it TOO saturated or it’ll look bad.

4. next i do a color balance layer. this is where it really starts differing depending on what color you want your gif to be.

5. next we move to the selective color layers, which are arguably the most powerful. here you can make colors pop, change colors, etc. it’ll take lots of practice & messing around with, but here’s what i did with this gif. this one is making yellow + blue pop

6. next, i did two more selective color layers editing the blue tab to make the blue pop even more

7. i still wasn’t quite happy with it, so i added another selective color layer to edit the blacks + neutrals + greens

8. for good measure, i added one more brightness/contrast layer

9. and the gif is done! however, you can play around with various adjustment layers until you’re happy. again, this is just an example of how to do basic coloring. it’s a skill like any other & takes practice. to keep consistent coloring in a gifset, 

9b. you may want to make a psd of this coloring. to do so, you need to put all your adjustment layers in a folder, delete your frame layers, and click file > save as. save it as a .psd. then you can open it and drag it onto any other gifs you make, adjusting the coloring accordingly but still with the same vibes. you don’t have to do this, but it makes life easier. here’s how to use your saved psd, though obviously you’re using your own in this case and not a downloaded one.

4. saving your gif

1. on photoshop cc 2019, you go to file > export > save for web (legacy). for other versions, you can just go to file > save for web. use these settings. the gif size limit is 3mb per gif, so make sure your file size is under that. if it’s not, you’ll need to delete some frames or some adjustment layers.

2. now, photoshop is a bit of a pain & this gif timing will not be right. so you need to open your newly saved gif. then you hit this button + select all frames

3. click this button & select “other”. tumblr gifs are typically .05-.08. my photoshop is glitchy and i have to set mine to .1-.15 or they’re WAY too fast. but usually, go with .05-.08 unless yours ends up glitching too.

4. save it like you did the first time and ta-da! you’ve made a gif!

[purpleswift]

hello!!!!! what sizing do u do for ur gifsets of 4?? also could u do a Tutorial on how to color gifs and add text to them on photoshop??? Thank u!

hi anon!! i usually use 268x268 or 268x360 or 268x380, it depends on how i want the gifs to look like, if i want them perfectly squared or kinda rectangular. you can play with height but remember to not change the width and always use 268 if you want to upload 2 gifs one next to each other and want them to look hq!

and since you asked here’s a quick tutorial on how i color gifs + add text! i’ll pick the coloring i used on my last gifset which is basically the coloring i do every time and i’ll start with this sharpened gif:

first of all, if you’re not familiar with gif making + gif sharpening here’s a great tutorial on how to do it! and before we begin keep in mind that every gif is different and that the same coloring might not fit different gifs (on other gifs it might be too bright, too dark, too blue, too purple, too pink, too this and too that) so you might have to make small changes to help the coloring fit the gif.

having said that, let’s proceed. all the adjustments are made by selecting a new adjustment layer from the top panel. so i start with adding curves and hit the “auto” button. sometimes i do it manually, but i often use the “auto” button! and then i add an exposition layer and increase “exposition” until it looks good to me. i usually like a high exposition on my gifs! for this gif i used exposition +0,63. and it now looks like this:

it looks too yellow now, doesn’t it? so i add a selective color layer, select yellow and set yellow to -100%. i usually don’t like yellow so in this way it looks kinda rosy and definitely less vibrant:

now i like to add photo filters! usually if the gif is too blueish you could use the sepia photo filter, while if the gif is too yellow/orange you could use one of the cooling filters or the deep blue filter. since i’m addicted to purple, i always choose the violet filter with the violet set to +25%. then i duplicate the photo filter layer twice. and the gif now looks like this:

now my favorite part: highlighting the purple! or turning the blue into purple. in this case the gif looks already pretty purple, but taylor’s guitar is still blue. so i’m gonna change the blue into purple. this process isn’t always made in the same way for each gif i work on, sometimes i use selective color + hue/saturation and sometimes i use only selective color or only hue/saturation. i play with blue a lot until it reaches a satisfying level of purple for me. in this case i used both selective color and hue/saturation. i added a selective color layer, selected blue and set:

cyan: -37%

magenta: +100%

yellow: -100%

black: 0

then i added a hue/saturation layer and set the blue hue to +30.

et voilà! the coloring is done! as i said before, this coloring with these exact options looks good on this gif but it might look less good on another gif. so you always have to further play with adjustment layers and see what happens - as i do every time!

additionally, adding a text is very simple: you just need to select the text tool from the tools bar to the left, click on the gif and write whatever you want. make sure to put the text layer above every other layer! then you can play with colors and text options by clicking twice on the text layer or selecting the text layer and then clicking on “layer” from the top panel, then “layer style”, then “blending options”. here i set the color of the text to #ffffff and the blending option to difference (probably my favorite option):

that’s it, i hope you enjoyed this tutorial and if you have other questions feel free to ask me. 💜

[hoedameron]

let me talk about my latest gifset here. the above gif was made when i was tinkering around with different settings to get my sharpening right and doesn’t have anything to do with the gifset i published lol.

typically i release an “aesthetic” gifset of different shots i found particularly interesting in the episode. however, when i was making the murder family gifset, i got incredibly drained from making it. the stress of downloading it, clipping the video, to making all five gifs with the text....to y’all it may not seem like much but i am still messing around with the sharpening atn which i thought i got it down but apparently...my method takes up a HUGE chunk of time and i’m actually like... :( because i thought it solved the problem. but whatever...i got it done xx

you’ll be surprised to know that the psd i used actually comes from a supernatural psd asjdklsajkldsa i tried other colorings but none of them really Respected the scene, you feel me? i didn’t want it to be too warm nor too cold so this one really did the job. do i wish it was a bit less warm and really make the skin color more “natural” (for a lack of better words)?? yeah, i kinda do BUT honestly, nothing in my arsenal can truly prepare one for prodigal son. that show is RUTHLESS with its coloring and make us content creators SUFFER -_-

before opening photoshop, i actually wrote down a few notes in my notebook for what colors i should use for the subtitles because i need three. i know the typical ones are usually black, white, and yellow but because the scene is so dark, i couldn’t use black so i went with another color i see some people use which is blue. the original hex code i had for it was...a bit much when i actually went into photoshop so i had used a lighter blue to really pop. i do like how the subtitles came out because i was worried i didn’t know what font y’all are using nowadays but luckily i had a psd to help with that <3 also i don’t like subtitles i feel like every time you put the text psd onto the gif, it’s never centered where you want it to and the way you gotta have it in the exact same place it was on the previous gif....girly....the pressure.

all and all, everything worked out really nicely. it just sucks that it took a huge chunk of time given the ordeal with the sharpening atn which i might go back to my usual “soft” sharpening because tbh.....it’s not worth the trouble. plus some people don’t really see any difference which sucks because i was really proud of that new sharpening....to me it made the gifs look crisper but i digress. it’s my eye for detail, really. 

[jamesleech]

Thought I would share some of my thinking with you guys on this new painting.

Into endless river Oil and pencil crayon on panel, 16" x 16", 2019

Prints available

It was inspired by this amazing old National Geographic article about this massive boat that carries 1000+ passengers through the Congo River - essentially a travelling merchant town barely floating down the river with a journey that can span several months. The one I read was printed in 1991 and I can’t find it online but you can read a more recent article that isn’t as good here lol - it’s pretty incredible.

Anyways, there was this photo of a man in a cramped coach cabin, seated among 40 others with his head resting in hand, deep in thought and/or exhausted from the voyage. It was a story about survival and struggle and people putting their all into the hopes for a better future for themselves and their family. Uprooting themselves and trading away what they know and love for opportunity. I’m privileged to have been on the receiving end of that kind of story but it’s what my parents went through and their parents before them - and those kinds of stories have always been deeply affecting to me. I never had the intention of making this into a full painting, but I had the biggest urge to sketch it out and after I did, I kinda just kept spending time with it.

I started with a digital sketch, building out the composition and major forms in light blue (which I like to do with oil paintings as well). The pose had this super heavy, architectural quality to it and the folded stripes of the shirt made for a beautiful contrast. I cropped the composition tightly around the figure to frame him in a state of discomfort and intensity.

I really liked the sketch so I started experimenting with compositional elements and bringing in more colours. I knew that I wanted something really vibrant and crazy - I wanted to somehow convey good vibes and bad vibes in the same image and let whoever’s looking at it reflect off of that. Once I felt like I had a good starting point laid out in Photoshop, I threw a grid over it, drew it out in light blue pencil crayon on my panel and got started. 

This is the first painting I’ve made where most of the critical decisions were discovered digitally. Unlike traditional media, it’s basically safe from any kind of commitment and it allowed for really fast, endless exploration. You can pick checkpoints throughout the process and branch out into different options. My intention for the digital stages was to only rough out possibilities - I wanted to save a fair amount of uncertainty for the actual oil painting process. In the future, I’d like to rely less on the digital stuff actually, as it kinda obviously makes things feel more predictable and I felt like it took some of the magic away.

The actual painting process has been pretty different from what I’m used to. It's very flat and pieced together, mostly single layer. Most of the elements have come together in a fragmented, designed way - not a whole lot of blending going on outside of the skin tones. Overall, I’m really happy with how intentional I was with this one, without having it look sterile or over-laboured (I hope). I’m excited to move on and work on more stuff, maybe similar to this one.

Palette:

Titanium white

Mars black

Burnt sienna

Yellow ochre

Cadmium yellow medium

Napthol vermillion

Phthalo blue

French ultramarine blue

Sap green

Viridian

I’m not used to doing this kinda thing - has this been helpful? Is there anything you guys would wanna know next time I do something like this? Send me questions!