Here are a few issues reported and some fixes, some common questions and the answers. If you have any of your own you would like answered, just email me. Contact info can be found at the bottom of this page.
You can also look for answers or post questions at the Ulead User to User Web Board, Web Utilities Forum, which I moderate.
GIF Animator 5 crashes when loading Video I/O
GIF Animator 5 crashes when clicking the "Optimize" tab in the workspace
How do I make a transparent gif?
Why is GIF Animator 5 messing up the edges when I optimize?
Why does my saved gif go slower than when I use the play button?
GIF Animator 5 crashes when loading Video I/O
This is due to video codecs on your system that the vio files in GA 5 aren't compatible with. You can fix this by deleting one or more of the VIO files in GIF Animator's program files, or by removing the entire VIO folder. Removing the VIO folder will remove the capability to work with video files entirely.
Your best bet is to remove one .vio file at a time. Move the file to your desktop so you can use it later. Start with the uvmpeg1.vio file, then try opening GA 5. If it still crashes, remove the uvavi.vio file. Try GA 5 again. If it works this time, try replacing the uvmpeg1.vio file. Open GA 5 again. If it crashes again, then both the uvmpeg1 and uvavi files are the culprits. If need be, you may also have to try removing the uvflc.vio files as well.
If you have PhotoImpact installed, the folder is located at C:\Program
files\Ulead Systems\PhotoImpact x\AnyGif\Vio
If you have GIF Animator only, then the folder is C:\Program files\Ulead
Systems\Ulead GIF Animator\Vio
Alternately:
If you click to view the error log, then you can try to determine the
exact cause for the crash. Click where it says to "click here."
A box will pop up that will have a "ModName" in the top right. This is the cause of the crash. In all likelihood, this is a video codec. If you unregister this codec in Windows, the error should no longer occur, and GA 5 will open normally. On the downside, and video files that require that codec to play will no longer play properly.
To unregister that codec in Windows, click Start, then Run. For this
example, I'm using the name of the codec shown in the screenshot. If you
have a different ModName in your error, use that. Be sure to copy the name
exactly.
Type "regsvr32 /U 3ivxdsencoder.ax" (without the quotes) and click OK to unregister that offending codec.
If you want to view a video later that needs that codec, do as above but do not include the '/U' in the command. Just remember to unregister it again to open GIF Animator 5.
GIF Animator 5 crashes when clicking the "Optimize" tab in the workspace
Sometimes GIF Animator 5 will freeze or crash when you go to the
Optimize Tab. This seems to only occur when your animation is of a large
area, such as 800 x 600 pixels or more, (or you are zoomed in on a smaller
animation) and the Auto-Optimize feature is on. To avoid this crash, just
use the zoom out tool
on the Tool
Panel to shrink the image down to a much smaller size. The smaller the
better, just to be safe. Don't forget to save your animation in UGA format
before you try optimizing, just in case.
How do I make a transparent gif?
If you're making a new animation, click "New" and make sure that "Fully
transparent" is selected under Canvas appearance. When you go to save your
animation, use the Optimization tab in the Workspace. If you just click 'File
and Save As...' or use the Save button to 'Save As,' it will use
whatever the current setting is on the Optimization tab, and if that does
not have Transparency turned on, it won't be transparent. If you want to
save your gif file with a transparent background, then this button must
be activated.
If you are trying to make an existing gif file with a background into a transparent one, then your best bet is to use the Magic Wand tool to select and remove the background from each object. See the Ulead GIF Animator 5 Basics tutorial, in the "Tools & Attributes" section for details on the Magic Wand tool. Once you're finished with that, change the Frame Removal Method to "Smart" then save as directed above.
Why is GIF Animator 5 messing up the edges when I optimize?
As you can see here, the bottom of the animation is being "clipped" after being optimized. GIF Animator 5 seems to do this on small animations with transparent backgrounds. This can be very annoying and perplexing, to say the least.
* Note: Firefox and Opera web browsers display this GIF normally, but Internet Explorer shows the bottom pixels clipping.
However, there is a very easy fix. Go to the Optimization Panel and
click the "show/hide Optimize Panel" button
.
It's the second from the right.
Go to the Advanced tab, and uncheck "remove
redundant pixels."
Now check out your animation in the Preview tab, and it should display as normal.
Now save your optimized GIF file and carry on!
An alternative way to correct this would be to expand the canvas size, so that there is at least a one-pixel transparent edge where the "clipping" was occurring.
Why does my saved gif go slower than when I use the play button?
The play button on the frame panel is mainly for a general preview of how things look, and may not be entirely accurate as far as speed goes.
The main factor is the browser (or other viewing software) used to view it with. The rendering engines of browsers differ, and this does affect playback speed. Internet Explorer (IE) can't seem to play animations with frame delay of 8 or less as quick as it should, while Firefox/Netscape do much better. Note that the Preview tab in GA 5 uses the IE rendering engine. Configure GA 5 (as noted on the section on the Preview tab) to view your GIF with several browsers.
It should also be noted that IE will sometimes play a gif with a transparent background at a different speed than the same animation with a background added.
Finally, the larger the GIF, both in number of frames and pixel area, the slower it will play. The gif98a file format was developed in 1998, and wasn't intended for very large animations. Saving your animation with GA 5 as a video or SWF file may have better results.
Questions? Comments? Suggestions?
Drop me a line!
