For this assignment, we had to design 3 GIFs specifically using Photoshop.
Oh Crop! GIF
Crop Still Image
May the 4th GIF
Stormtrooper Still Image
Clone Army GIF
Clone Army Still Image
Scroll for Creative Process
To start my process with this assignment, I went on a deep rabbit hole dive of GIFs. Dribbble (yes, there is a triple 'b') was a great resource for inspiration. This helped me figure out what works in a gif, what I wanted to focus on for this project, and of course made me want to reach for the moon with this project. I mean, I did, considering the semi- Star Wars theme, however, I think this was the hardest part of project to realize that I wanted to do seamless looping gifs with complicated illustrations, but I had to realize that my expertise wasn't there yet.
I had several things I wanted to try from making a literal clone army with bobbing heads of differing sizes to a Yoda GIF complete with a spinning lightsaber throw. However, within the time constraints and my limited experience with GIF creation, I toned back my expectations to fit within the limits of this assignment. Out of any of the assignments, this is the one I had the most fun completing next to the Patterns assignment, so I think I will be continuing to learn more about GIFs and what it takes to make a seamless one.
Spin GIF Inspiration
Yoda Inspiration GIF
Seamless Loop Inspiration GIF
The Smoothness Inspiration GIF
Oh Crop! GIF
This GIF came to me when I was originally brainstorming what to do for this project. May 4th hadn't happened yet, so star wars GIFs in all their glory hadn't consumed my thoughts yet. So, I was looking at photoshop gif tutorial images when one of those T-shirt ads just popped up on my screen (pictured right). The design was so simple and the tagline was so cheesy, I just couldn't resist.
I even thought of other photoshop tools I could animate such as the eyedropper tool and the healing spot brush, but ultimately the crop tool was the easiest to implement into an actual character. I wanted to bring the crop tool to life and the ability to emulate the facial expressions of being squished and then coming back to proportion again. I think that I successfully emulated this, though I could have added a few more frames, in my opinion, to make the GIF itself less choppy.
Still Picture
Photoshop Joke Inspirations
Original Mapping Ideas
Illustrator File Artboards
May the Fourth GIF
I was so excited to do this gif though I'll admit, I originally had a much different vision for this one than the final version that I actually ended up going with. For the first draft, I had only text on the board, alternating between the color of darkside red sabers and lightside blue sabers. I had found the video below 2 weeks ago right at the end of the advertising assignment and I thought it would be such a cool effect to employ in slow motion. So, I wanted the red and the blue to mingle and reference the contrast but also the balance between the red and the blue. If you're a true Star Wars fan you'll know that the light cannot exist without the darkness and vice versa. However, I wasn't getting the effect to look exactly the way that I wanted it to, so I switch thought processes.
I went to Unsplash and looked up different Star Wars photos that were creative commons and royalty free. I tried it with the stormtrooper helmet and the Boba Fett images, but still wasn't happy with the effect. I also struggled to get all the layers of the effect to stay separate because I was using Photoshop actions to repeat the process for each frame.
All struggles aside, I am so happy with how this gif turned out. I also find it funny because out of all the characters in Star Wars the stormtroopers are easily one of the most recognizable characters and they are featured in banners like the blue picture to the right for all of this Star Wars hype advertising and yet, the force is with them the least. The poor stormtroopers are always the ones getting forgotten in the actual story lines because they are just so expendable. They are literally clones of each other. So, I thought it was fitting to have the stormtrooper being inked out.
Draft 1
Distortion Map (Influences the texture of the bleed)
Reminded me of Hyperdrive
Failed Bleed 1 Attempt
Failed Bleed 2
Original Image
Image Edited
Inspiration
Clone Army GIF
Out of the three, I think I struggled with my 'Clone Army' the most because I wanted to play with three varieties of motion. I wanted the helmets to bob up and down, to move down on a diagonal, to gradually get larger the closer they were perceived by the viewer, and then have this be a seamless loop. That was too much. The gif itself was inspired by the stormtrooper gif above, and I used Illustrator to make the iconic helmet based on the clone trooper variety (pictured right).
Ultimately while it wasn't as flashy, I think that having the trooper helmet repeatedly coming at you shows the never ending replication of clones I was going for, but I definitely think that given more time and experience, I will GIF-ify my army of clones one day. It's a great idea that I'm surprised another designer hasn't already implemented extensively, at least, there wasn't much based on what I looked into.
The background I illustrated with low opacity splatter brushes for size variation to look like the stars in space and I really like how the animation of the stars looks sort of similar to hyperdrive. I'm going to try to do a designated hyperspace GIF in the future. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed my creative process and that you like Star Wars. If you don't maybe you're at least intrigued now?
Initial Sketch
Helmet Illustration
Clone Trooper Inspo
Inspiration
Background
Background w/ Helmet
What I wanted to do with stormtroopers...
Oh Crop!
May the 4th
Clone Army
Thanks for reading!