PupChow

Technically this is an ImageReady question, but I hope somebody might know the solution to this problem.

I have compiled a gif animation in ImageReady, but even with the delay set as 0sec, the output runs slow. When I preview the animation in the program, it runs fast, but as soon as I saved it, it becomes slow again.

Is there some settings I missed?

JoeD

Strange, I've only experienced this slow down the other way around; the animation runs slow in the preview window, but fast once viewed in a browser.

I do know that animations run slower in Imageready when there are a lot of frames that don't fit all at once in the animation window, a reason why Imageready has to scroll the frames left all the time when you play the animation, which slows down the animation in the preview window.
At least that's the case on my rather slow computer.
People who are not aware of this slowdown in Imageready, will therefore be surprised to see their animation going faster when they preview it on their web site for example. It is important to preview the animation in the preview window only and not in the animation window that contains the frames.

To speed up the preview you can;

a) resize the animation window so that it shows all frames at once
b) or start the animation and then close the animation window (not the preview window)

I also have to mention that some sometimes I noticed speed differences while viewing the same animated gif in different programs (browsers, image viewers), so that might be the case too.

I'm not aware of any special animation settings, other than the delay that you can enter for each frame. Very large gifs might also have an influence on the overall speed.

theKeeper

Besides the main speed settings within IR an animation's speed is controlled by a couple other factors... one being the user's computer, and the other being the browser that renders the animation. It's been noted that IE plays animations slower than other browsers, but they all have their own varying degrees of tempo/speed.

Is the change in speed really that noticeable?
Can we see the animation?

As Joe mentioned too, pixel size will also be a determining factor.

PupChow

Hey guys, thanks for the responses. Well the gif itself is pretty big... around 56K. The main contributing factor is the many animated frames of the hermit crab (18 I think?), so that might be a major factor... here, let me know how fast/slow it goes for you guys. It should be running really, really fast; right now it looks as if the hermit is taking a stroll. For the record I am using Firefox and on a pretty respectable machine.



For comparison, please check out my web site (http://www.mokoloco.com) and look at the preloader, ideally the hermit should be running at that pace.

theKeeper

Hmm... ya that is odd huh?
Don't think i've come across this specifically before. Can't really explain it either. I tried a few things out with no difference at all.
Until i did one certain thing... i duped the frame where the legs are crossed, and stuck it in between the frames where the legs are straight out. In the 2nd image below you'll notice that for a split second (frames 1,2 & 3) the legs appear to move faster. Perhaps this is your solution...?

I did however manage to knock almost 10K off the size by Optimizing it. [righton] 64 colour palette w/Dithering. Type of reduction was 'Perceptual'.

Here's an idea... this is so small/simple an animation why not just do it in the Flash format? It should be a much smaller file size and is guaranteed to play properly. Unless of course you're creating this as an example for your portfolio.

PupChow

Thanks! Yeah that's the speed I want playing, I guess I'll go in and cut some frames to make the hermit runs faster. I opted for animated gif cause it's more universal. I am not sure if everybody got flash player installed now, so I just went with the old school way. Little did I know I'd run into problems with gif as well, doh!

Thanks again for the help, and you're right, I can't see any difference between the two gifs color-wise, I think I'll go for the 64 color.

Welles

Hey PupChow. That's a fun GIF. :} :} :}

JoeD

I agree with Welles , great animation [righton]

theKeeper

Actually PupChow 98% of folks using semi to modern browsers are equipped by default with the Flash plugin. And those that aren't get redirected automatically usually to install the plugin 'on-the-fly', then returned back to the page they're on. No fuss no muss.