because sandy evidently hates herself and has to put herself through this process

One typically needs two things, oh, wait, three things to start the magical journey of giffing a tv show.

A good photoshop download (for PC + Mac), a capping software (i’ll be using VLC in this tutorial, but KM player works too), and a source to downloading a good tv show in Web-DL.

First, you need to preset your settings for the VLC capping. Since I’m kind of the laziest person in the universe, I’ve found one for you. I’m pretty sure the default hotkeys for capping are shift+s, but if they’re not, just go to preferences<hotkeys<take video snapshot. 

Now, just open your episode (under Media) and start capping.

I like to slow it down so it looks smoother by hitting the “slow” button twice.

I just hold down shift+s (or whatever your hotkey is) for the scene I want and it appears in the folder you chose to put your caps in.

It should look something like this.

Notice the little preview in the corner.

Once you have your screencaptures safely tucked into your folder, now all you have to do is open them in photoshop.

Just open PS, and if your version doesn’t completely SUCK like the download I use (the one I linked) you should be able to just go File<Scripts<Load Files into a stack

BUT, if your version does suck like mine, you’re stuck just opening all of your caps into PS and dragging them on top of each other.

But, more than likely, loading the files into a stack will work. You just open the caps you want to use (I’d aim for around 15/20, what with the new gif limit and all) and it falls into layers.

It will appear as such

OH! And if it’s not already, set your animation bar up by going,

And then clicking

Now you just go to Image<Resize<500x281

Hit okay, and it will resize into the universal tumblr size for gifs.

Now, just hit the same menu, except this time press “Select All Frames”

 

Then, press the little drop down arrow on one of the animation frames (we’re going to just set the delay) and hit “Other”

I used to go around 0.15-0.2, but I go around 0.07 now because it honestly looks SO much smoother

Then just hit OK!

Now, for sharpening.

Here’s an amazing tutorial that’s saved me tons of time on sharpening. Use this.

Here are the settings I typically use for smart sharpen.

It really, honestly varies on how much to sharpen a gif, as far as amount goes. I like it around 300, but I know Cams and other people generally like 500. As long as the radius is at 0.4 or so and Gaussian blur is removed, just play around with the amount until the preview looks nice enough.

After that, all that’s left is just to put your coloring on! I might do a tutorial on that later..? I dunno. But I know a lot of the other girls who run this blog and I have some PSDs up if you wanna use them.

Just drag the PSD you wanna use onto your gif, and tah-dah!

Now all that’s left to do is save and post!

Just go to file<save for web and devices

Make sure the KB is under 1,000 

and the presets are as followed

And you’re set! I might do a tutorial on cutting KB, but, like I said, as long as it’s under 20 frames, you should be okay. And just delete some frames, reduce colors (see above), or crop if you are over the limit.

Hopefully this helped! Just hit us up if you have any more questions.

ALSO

here are some additional tips/tricks/tutorials from all of us.