Animated Avatars and You

[Souplex]

Now many of you have no doubt noticed a few of the animated avatars on the site.
You may have noticed that the majority of them are terrible.

Souplex is here to help improve your lives, as always.

Rules for making a good animated avatar:
1. The motion should loop well. Otherwise there's that awkward frame where it jumps back.
2. No moving camera. Otherwise it's disorienting when it jumps back.
3. Keep the animation short. It's obnoxious if it drags on for too long.
4. No obnoxious bright flashes.
5. Keep it contained to one shot.
Follow these simple rules and you'll do fine.

Spoiler: An animated avatar that actually gets it right

You're welcome.
Captcha: it is fair

Edit: Really, what you should ask yourself first is; "Should this be animated?" Most animated avatars are animated for no real reason. You're just making an already slow site load slightly slower.

Spoiler: A prime example of an avatar where being animated doesn't add anything

The image moving doesn't add anything. You could achieve the same effect with a still image.

Unless being animated adds something other than being animated, don't do it.

 

[staika]

Well let's go through the check list, I'm pretty sure I'm going to fail somewhere but.
1: Well my avatar loops really well in my opinion, so check.
2: I made it so that the words stay in the same area some use more lines though.
3: And I fail here, mine is a pretty long animation but it has over 100 frames but they do go by fast.
4: I don't believe mine flashes, but the quick movements can be distracting.
5: Well the entire thing is the same shot with different words so I guess I pass this one.

I don't think my avatar is that obnoxious, it's just a game and people really seem to like it. I even had the pub club members help me make it and almost all of these deaths were ideas from other users. But at the end of the day I like it as my avatar and if someone doesn't well too bad.

 

[tippy2k2]

Rule one and two feel like the same rule (they are technically different but the problems they cause are the same) to me but other than that, I 100% agree.

There are of course, exceptions to these rules. For example, I've always liked Mr Fusion's gif (see above). Even though it's long, it's fairly simple and something that any gamer can relate to. Sometimes to achieve true greatness, you have to break the rules.

Personally, I like the really subtle ones where you can barely tell that it's animated. People who do it that way are awesome and way better than everyone else!
.>
That's not suspicious of me to say, right?

EDIT: WHAAA! Daystar has the PERFECT example of an animated gif! I can no longer 100% agree.

 

[sky14kemea]

Rule one and two feel like the same rule (they are technically different but the problems they cause are the same) to me but other than that, I 100% agree.

There are of course, exceptions to these rules. For example, I've always liked Mr Fuzion's gif (see above). Even though it's long, it's fairly simple and something that any gamer can relate to.

Personally, I like the really subtle ones where you can barely tell that it's animated. People who do it that way are awesome and way better than everyone else!
.>
That's not suspicious of me to say, right?

Gah, I was staring at your avatar for a full minute! Very clever....

OT: I'd love a nice looping avatar, but I'm really fussy, so I've never found one I like. Mostly because I'd want one where I can draw around each frame and edit it into my continuous blonde hair thing that I've had going for a long time. o:

 

[Frezzato]

Aww, and this is where I fail.

Actually, I like watching yours loop and I'm sure others do too. Just sayin'.

 

[[Kira Must Die]]

Yep... just gonna leave this post here...

Anyways, I do tend to look for simple looping avatars when I feel like changing mine, or at least try to fix it so it does, but I'm fine if it doesn't fit rule 1, as long as it's helps express my love for whatever is portrayed in said avatar, or is at least cool or cute.

 

[Lucem712]

Rules? I don't need your rules! [small]I'm not bitter because my gif isn't looped or anything. >_>[/small]

Eh, some perfectly looped gifs are alright but I don't think it is so bad if a gif has a jump in it. Some of my favourite user gif avatars aren't looped or follow that formula. *shrug*

 

[DoPo]

I don't think my avatar is that obnoxious

Well...it depends - you do have a couple of spelling mistakes in it. I don't really mind but it's very slightly irritating, with everything else spelled correctly. I'd imagine a grammar Nazi would find it properly obnoxious, though.

Rules? I don't need your rules!

You, you, outlaw! I am a model citizen while you defile me with your very presence. I demand justice and protection from you and your ilk.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

SNIP

Your avatar makes me nervous :|

OP: You just wait. Someday I'll make a Zim GIF. And it'll be the bestest Zim GIF of them all.
In the meantime, I'm content with static Zim.

 

[Souplex]

Sometimes it's impossible to get a looped GIF because the source itself does not provide the right motion to make it loop and rewinding it sometimes doesn't make it look right anyways.

If it can't be looped, it shouldn't be a GIF avatar. There are avatars that aren't GIFs you know.

 

[Nouw]

Hahaha all my gif avatars broke these rules, which has nothing to do with mine being static, really >.>. I'd just like to say 1 and 2 can be easily avoided by a fade to black which my clown one had.

 

[hiphop8004]

Mines would be find but for some reason when it concerted to an icon it kinda messed up

 

[IceForce]

Most animated avatars are animated for no real reason. You're just making an already slow site load slightly slower.

Well, you know what the solution to that is, right?

This:

 

[TheRightToArmBears]

I've actually had quite a few PMs from people saying they were distracted by my avatar for a good couple of minutes- It's a personal source of pride that I have added to the site's ability to kill productivity so effectively.

 

[Rip Van Rabbit]

[HEADING=3]Are you happy now, Soup!?[/HEADING]

<---- Look at her! She's just dancing innocently!

She loops well, there is no camera movement, animation is short, no bright flashes and it's all in one shot.

And she's adorable.

[HEADING=3]Does this finally satisfy your criteria!?[/HEADING]

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

OK, my avatar meets the first 5 rules nicely.

Unless being animated adds something other than being animated, don't do it.

However this one is a little more tricky, as it is more of a personal preference than anything.

 

[Evil Smurf]

You forgot the rule about how it needs to be a cat avatar.

 

[likalaruku]

Opposite for me. I like the long ones & the short looping ones get boring 6 times as fast.

You can tell I'm a sadist, because mine makes people relive their least favorite moment of FF7 over & over again.

 

[JoJo]

Reading this thread makes me nostalgic for the times I've had an animated avatar, maybe I should find a way to animate the old Big Daddy here.

Anyhow, since we're critiquing avatars I'll turn the spotlight on yours Souplex, I'm afraid it's breaking one of the unwritten rules of static avatars: having far too much detail for it's size. At close inspection, it appears to be a young man either hugging or wrestling Zeus/God, surrounded by lightning, but it's difficult to make out. Until I looked carefully today, I didn't really register what it was at-all. That said, it's not just you, there are a lot of avatars on this site which are large detailed images which probably looked awesome when they were full-sized but once they are shrunk down to Escapist avatar sizes are impossible to make out properly. Cropping is your friend in these situations.

 

[trollnystan]

Heh, I guess you have a problem with Maru winning my avatar-changing poll, eh? Well, he's staying for a while, regardless of bad looping. I tried my best to make it look good, but my photoshopping skills are terrible. And I think it's cute! I agree with @Jojo above me btw - your own avatar is a bit hard to tell what it is. Still, I recognise it as yours and that's what's important! (says the person who recently changed hers)