GA Snow

This tutorial will show you how to make snow in Gif Animator 5

Sadly GA5 is not being supported anymore by Ulead or  Corel, so the life of this tutorial and other tutorials that I have written for Gif Animator 5 will I think be limited.

A copy of Gif Animator 5  30 day  Free Trail

OK lets get started!!

Open your GA 5 program and click on the Blank Animation button.

Information Only

If the start up wizard does not open when you open your GA and if you want it to open, you will need to follow these steps.

Step 1	Goto File/Preferences or if the keyboard shortcut works on your computer hit F6
Step 2	Click on your General tab
Step 3	Put a tick in the Enable Start up Wizard box
Step 4	Click OK

There is no need for the start up wizard really but is useful information.

The instructions without the start up wizard are below.

Or

Without using the Start up Wizard

Open your GA program

 Object/New Blank Object.

 Edit/Canvas Size and make it

500 W X 100 H

No tick in Keep Aspect Ratio box

A dot in by Position  box.

middle button (Align Center) depressed.

This will make it re-size from the centre.

Click OK

Check to make sure that your foreground colour is black, your background colour is white.

Click on your paint bucket icon and fill this New Blank Object layer with black.

Click on the Insert a blank object icon again or Ctrl+Alt+D to create the snow layer.

This will give you 2 layers on one frame in the storyboard.

1 with your black fill (on the bottom) and the top layer blank as this is the snow layer.

Highlight your snow layer.

Switch the foreground colour to white by clicking on the switch arrows.

Click on your paintbrush, select the round brush and we will start with it set at;

Tick in allow painting in Transparent area box.

Dot the size 3 brush all over the snow layer sparingly.

Change your paintbrush to

Tick in allow painting in Transparent area box.

Dot the size 5 brush over your snow layer in some of the blank spaces keeping in mind that we have one more size to complete the snow.

Change your paintbrush to

Tick in allow painting in Transparent area box.

Dot the size 7 brush over your snow layer in the blank spaces that are left.

Look at your snow layer and if it looks like snow, then you are ready to move to the next stage.

Goto Edit/Canvas Size and depress the top button this time (this will add 400 pixels to the bottom of your image) and type 500 in the width and height.

There should be No tick in the Keep aspect ratio box but there should be a dot in the By Position box.

Switch your Foreground colour back to black

fill your bottom layer (has an extra 400 pixels) with the colour black

This will allow you to see what you have to do next a lot better.

1. Highlight your snow layer right-click/Duplicate Object.

2. Click on your pick tool

3. Very lightly touch your snow and then use your arrow keypad on your keyboard, to move the snow down until it is at the bottom of the first layer.

If your arrow keys on your keyboard don't move the snow down, very carefully pull your snow layer down to the bottom of the previous snow layer with your pick tool.

Check were the two snow layers meet and if they look seamless..............follow steps 1-3 three more times so that you have a total of 5 snow layers.

TIP: keep your finger pressed down on the down arrow and it will move faster, be warned though it takes off and moves very fast.............rofl.

If your keypad on your keyboard does not move the snow, there is an alternate move Method below.

Alternate Method

Snow 1

Snow 2

Snow 3

Snow 4

Snow 5

Whichever way you moved your snow..........

Your snow should now fill the 500 x 500 image from top to bottom.

If you are happy that you have it all lined up nicely, then highlight the 5 snow layer objects.

NOTE: Before merging as a single object save your layers as a UGA file.

It is always handy to save your snow in unmerged condition as you may want to add or detract from the snow at a later date.

 File/Save As/UGA file.

Right-click and merge as a single object.

Highlight your bottom black layer right-click/Delete object,  you don't need this layer anymore.

File/Save as/UGA ( UFO or  PSD) file.

The next step is to animate your snow.

Information: The reason for making your snow layer only 100 pixels in height in the first instance and then adding another 400 pixels to the bottom is because:

The duplicating and moving down of the snow, gives the snow when animated, a more natural falling motion.

In the Snow Animation Tutorial I have worked out how much to move the snow down in each frame so that the last frame is at the bottom of the (100 pixel height) next snow repetition 

ANIMATING  YOUR SNOW

Please feel free to  print this tutorial out for your own personal use, but do not re-write and claim as your own or pass through email groups.

Any resemblance to any other tutorial like this, is not intentional and is purely coincidental.

This tutorial was written on the 2nd December 2009 and is therefore

© to Edna Munn

Website and web set Design

Also created

by

Edna Munn