Photoshop Animations

One of Photoshops many uses is creating simple cell animations which can be exported to other programmes. Photoshop Animation was a skill I had learnt to do before the course but only for simple things. This is because Animation on Photoshop is a very limited process and doesn't let you create complicated animations. To achieve some of the better animations, you have to trick the system...

Usually, the image you are using for your animation can't be changed frame by frame as it changes every single other frame with it. So for instance, if I  rotate a square 10 degress in in the 3rd frame, it will also rotate the square in the first and second frame, limiting what you can do. To get around this annoying issue you have to plan for each and every change you want to happen. Then create one image with a new layer for each change to the image you are going to make.

Here you will duplicate the frame as usual but your fous as an animator will be on the layers. So now, to get altered image I want on screen without changing every other frame, raise this layers Opacity to 100%. Everything else you don't want visibile should be altered to 0%. Doing this for every frame will give you the effect you want.

Using my first set of original generated images, used for testing, I created a small loop where a light flickers on and off illuminating a character.

Below is an animated GIF of my first test using CS2 (click to view):