I didn’t quite understand what a gif was until earlier this week, but even then, I felt intimidated by the gif assignments. I clicked on the link to a good example of the assignment I wanted to do, but I ended up finding another assignment (no idea how that happened) that sounds even better. For 3.5 stars, I did the Muppet GIFS assignment.

Here’s the glorious piece:

I’ve always loved the Muppets, from watching Sesame Street’s muppets to the single-season return of the Muppets on a mockumentary-style show on ABC. Except maybe when Miss Piggy and Kermit broke up. That was traumatizing.

Well anyway, I found a fun moment in the good old original Muppet show, and used makeagif.com to make it. The process is surprisingly simple.

The homepage looks like the image above (as you could probably guess from the fact the web address, highlighted, is the same one I directed you to). I used the YouTube option for this assignment, circled below in a dashed pink line.

Not the most beautiful edited screenshot, but it shows you what to click on. When you click on that, you’ll see this screen:

Next, you just have to enter the URL address for the YouTube video you want. I used The Muppet Show Theme (Season One). This is the video:

Below is what the page looked like when I saw the video on YouTube. I just copied the web address from the bar: “https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvnHgKkNKR4” (next to the green lock icon).

On makeagif.com, enter in that web address as prompted.

Here, you can adjust when the gif starts and how long it is with the little yellow bars. Just click on them and drag until you like the preview. (I can’t show that in the tutorial because my mouse cursor does not appear in screenshots, but its fairly straightforward.) You can also select the quality, the category the website will put it in, and tag it so others can use your gif. 

Finally, you’ll get your gif, ready to be viewed and downloaded.

To add text, you simply click on the T+ icon (the second from the left at the bottom of the gif). It will take you to this screen that explains how to do it. Note: my caption had nothing to do with the clip. I just added the text on to make the gif a little funnier. Not everyone immediately smiles when they think of Kermit’s goofy face popping up from inside the letter O, although I can’t imagine why.

Whew. Well that’s how I made my first gif. Hope it helps someone out. If nothing else, know that makeagif.com is a great tool. I would definitely recommend it to another student in ds106, especially if you’re unfamiliar with the gif format. Happy gif-ing!

P.S. I did not notice that Disney insignia on the bottom left-hand corner until now, and now its irritating me. Disney ruins everything they buy. R.I.P. Winnie the Pooh. R.I.P. Star Wars. And R.I.P. Muppets.

If you need further proof Disney ruined the Muppets, here:

Ah yes, Gonzo. So important, yet so under appreciated. I think the Muppet’s and Sesame Street, among many other shows are a staple to most millennials childhood. This is probably why, doing this assignment (worth 3 and a half stars) sparked interest in me- I grew up with the Muppet’s.  I chose Gonzo because he is an oddity of the animal kingdom, no one knows exactly what he is or where he came from- yet he brings joy and happiness to everyone (or Muppet) he comes in contact with. Look at that face, don’t you just want to give him a hug?

I tried creating a GIF ( how do you pronounce that?!) in GIMP with an animation plug-in called GAP (Short for: Gimp Animation Package), but of course my never ending brawl with technology occurred once again. The program crashed and I had to restart my computer. So after about thirty minutes of tinkering around the program and having the program crash yet again, I decided to use something else. In the previous GIF assignment, I used a handy website called MakeAGif. So I pasted the link to the video of the multiple Gonzos dancing around and the website already puts the video on a loop from the beginning. If you are technologically challenged (like me), all you need to do is to pick a time place in the video and set how many seconds you want the GIF to loop and Congrats! You have yourself a GIF! The only other problem I had with this assignment was the video quality, I tried searching for the same video in a better quality but I couldn’t find any.

It’s Animal from the muppets. He’s the very best. I mean look at him.

That’s hella hardcore, you have to admit it. Full video can be found here

I made this for the Muppet GIFs assignment (3 and a half stars). There was no way I couldn’t do this one. I love the muppets and I have for years. My favorite is Kermit, there’s something about his attitude and outlook on life that really speaks to me.

But for this gif, I did not use my favorite as subject matter. I chose Animal. Why? Because he’s the world’s best drummer. And I have drumming on my mind right now. I recently started learning to play the drums (Beginning of April) and I haven’t had much time lately to practice. It’s got me feeling sort of down. I feel so at peace playing the drums. I don’t know, maybe it has something to do with repeatedly hitting something?

I created this using photoshop. First I downloaded the video of Animal, then I picked a section to import into ps as layers. I made all the layers into frames. Then I took those frames and duplicated them. The duplicated frames I then went in and reversed. So the whole gif goes through and then reverses. I did this because at the end he kind of bounces up and I thought it would be cool to see him go back down. So the whole gif is kind of up down up down.

One thing that bothers me is the overall quality. The video wasn’t like the best, so the gif is a bit grainy. Other than that I’m pretty cool with it.