Here's one way of making a Gradient Text animation...
1. Open PhotoImpact (PI) and start a new image (size as you require). I
use a white background but transparent may be used if you wish.
Write your text in black using desired font and resize to fit the background,
leaving a small space all around. Then centre the text
in the background.
Make a copy of the text and background and put this
aside until later so that it may be used to convert to a 3D
pipe border or given a coloured border and put behind the finished animation for
a different effect.
2. With your text highlighted (Selected) go to "Edit, Fill,
Gradient, Multiple Colors" and choose a scheme from the wheels/rings shown there. I chose
030 in this case as all the colours shown flow into each
other without sharp lines between.
Change both "Hue Shift" and "Ring" values to
"0."
Click "OK" twice and the selected gradient will be applied to your text in workspace. See below:
3. With text selected, save as a .ufo file to a folder on your hard drive. I have named
this one "Fill 1.ufo."
This same folder should be used for all 12 .ufo images that you will be making.
4. The text in the workspace
should still be highlighted, so now you simply go back to "Edit, Fill, Gradient,
Multiple Colors" but this time you change the ring value to "30."
Click "OK" twice as before and the new gradient will
be applied, replacing the gradient you had in step 1 above.
Save as before, "Fill 2.ufo."
5. Continue repeating the steps
above (changing the ring value by adding 30 each time) until the last one has a value of 330 and
your hard drive folder contains 12 files.
I have 13 files, but one is a pipe outline that will be used as a border on the finished
image.
6. Now close PI and browse to your folder that contains
the .ufo images you have made.
Open all 12 of these in Ulead GIF
Animator, making sure to keep the order correct (1 - 12).
All that is necessary now is
to turn off the eyes in object manager that correspond to the white
backgrounds (unless you want a background, of course).
Select one of the text images
in the Object Manager. Then click "Edit, Crop canvas." Set your desired frame
delay, then optimize and save as a .gif animation.
Note: If you want to use a
border, you will need to add that before cropping.
I hope this has been helpful to you!
This tutorial is copyright © 2006 MrMinster
