I’ve been back from my vacation in Mexico for a few days and while editing my pictures, I still can’t get over how beautiful the sunsets were two nights I stayed at the amazing St. Regis Punta Mita. Suffice it to say, I have a lot of gorgeous pictures of sunsets on the beach.
Original photo of a spectacular Mexican sunset (no filter) on the beach at the St. Regis Punta Mita
During my photo editing, I noticed that a bunch of the pictures I took were only spaced a few seconds apart and from pretty much the same angle. So I started thinking about other things I could do with them. I decided to try making them into one of those fun, animated GIFs that you see all over Tumblr. This might be an amusing way for me to re-visit my vacation with the use some awesome mobile photography app technology!
There are a few animated GIFs makers out there, and I confess I haven’t used all of them. My animated GIF app of choice is giffer! Pro, because you have the option of shooting the images within the app, or if you’re like me, you can add images days later, after your tequila daze has lifted. Another bonus: giffer! Pro now it comes with cool, instagram-like filters so you can change the effect and vibe of your animated GIF.
I used the same images for all these GIFs. Here’s what it turned out like with giffer! Pro and the “trippy” filter:
St. Regis Punta Mita Sunset on the beach.
Using giffer! Pro and the cool Anzio filter, you get more of a zen, early-bird like effect.
This might be my favorite version of this St. Regis Punta Mita Sunset animated GIF experiment.
To make the natural colors more intense, I tried out the marigold filter:
St. Regis Sunset, using giffer! Pro, with Marigold Filter
You can also use Giffer! Pro and shoot your GIFS within the app itself, which is a nice feature to have. The app allows you to share your Giffy animated goodness via SMS, email, twitter and Tumblr fairly easily. Facebook, being Facebook, isn’t so great handling the animated GIFS.
L: Screenshot explaining how the app integrates on Facebook& Giffer R: Screenshot of how the Gif posted on twitter
I’m a big fan of the Giffer! Pro app, although I think the user interface could be a little clearer and more user friendly, particularly about how to start a new project. However I’ve found the app developer, Taber Buhl (@taberbuhl on twitter) is easy to reach and open to feedback. He wants his app to be great.
While Giffer! Pro is my preferred animated GIF app of choice, there are other animated gif makers out there. In fact, Gif Cam which appears to be free for a limited time, is my second go-too animated GIFs maker. I find it’s user interface is slightly more intuitive and easier to use, but it lacks the fun filter options.
St. Regis Punta Mita Sunset, Gif (Gif Cam version, without a filter)
Here’s a Tip: You can even import photos you didn’t should on your iPhone and turn them into animated GIFS. Just email the images to yourself, save them on your iPhone camera roll and open up your animated GIF creator of choice and animate away!