Melancholy Kaleidoscope

1. screen capturing / organizing & renaming caps

i start by making individual folder(s) for each gif i plan to create in my capture folder on my desktop. for the sake of time, i'm only making one gif here, but i number each folder for multiple gifs.

open my video in kmplayer (yes i use an older version) and make continuous caps to my designated capture folder by pressing "start" a couple seconds before my desired shot, playing the video, then pressing "stop" when i have all my frames.

delete extra frames from the capture folder and move the frames i'm using to their respected folders. if i were making more than one gif, i'd be splitting them up into their own numbered folders.

select all frames inside each folder and rename them to "1". this is purely so the actions i made to open my frames using the image sequence method will work correctly. i chose the number 1 because it's the fastest for me to type. if i were opening my frames by loading them as dicom files instead, i would skip this step entirely as i have a separate action to open them that way and this isn't necessary in that case.

2. loading frames / cropping / sharpening

you'll see that i have an action group to open up to 12 gifs. i made these so i could load all my gifs into photoshop very fast and all at once as image sequences, which i've only started doing recently. i just hold shift and select as many numbers pertaining to my gif folders as i need and press play. it opens those folders as image sequences and my gif is already made. here, i just played the action for folder number 1.

i select my desired crop preset and make sure it looks good. this is when i'd apply keyframes if there was a lot of movement and i needed to pan the gifs to keep everything centered.

my go-to sharpening action contains: smart sharpen (500%, 0.3) -> smart sharpen (10%, 10) twice -> sharpen (opacity 20%). the last sharpen is optional and you'll see me decide to toggle that off for this gif. you'll notice i have other various sharpening actions and some for adding noise, but i'm not adding any for this gif. if i had multiple gifs open, i'd do all my cropping, panning, sharpening in each window before playing the next action for each one.

i play my convert to frames action. you'll see me point out that my crop size is 2 pixels bigger than it needs to be and my convert to frames action will subtract those two pixels after it converts. this is to get rid of that transparent border before i save it for tumblr. my action also sets my speed to 0.05.

3. coloring

yep, i have an action that applies all my go-top adjustment layers in the order i like them and groups it all together for me. i start from the bottom with curves and make my way up. i don't always use every layer, but it's there if i need it.

this is really just me bouncing around between layers until i'm satisfied with the coloring. i would take my time more if i wasn't recording, i usually am very focused on this and it can take me a while.

4. saving

i always save my gifs as adaptive + diffusion and give it a name that's easy to remember, usually something to do with the media itself. that's it :)

i'm sorry if any of this was confusing, but i hope you learned something and i could provide faster methods for you to experiment with to make your process go a bit faster and smoother.

if you have any questions about anything, just ask!

if anyone else wants to share literally any part of their process like pat and dasha shared their sharpening settings or maybe how you color your gifs or import them, i think any step is a great thing to share! everyone has their ways and it's fun to see all the different methods and techniques. i hope it encourages people to keep creating and supporting each other.

no pressure to participate, but i'm gonna tag @jung-koook @hobipowers @hyyhhope and @jinstronaut to do this tag however they see fit 💜

thanks for reading!

How old do I have to be to attend?

18+ only please! I want everyone to feel safe and comfortable to speak freely.

Can I bring a friend?

The invitation is open to everyone, so sure!

What time do I need to join by? The game will begin at 6PM Eastern Time, but you can show up anytime until around midnight Eastern Time.

I'm shy. Can I still come?

Just like me twin lol fortunately for you, the games don't require actually talking to other people. Just pushing buttons and having a good time. So you can come and play and you don't have to say much if you don't want to, but you're free to jump in to conversations anytime.

I don't ship the same ship(s) as you/ I'm not active in the fandom, can I still come?

As long as you don't have a problem with BuckTommy shippers, you're more than welcome, no matter what you ship or how active you are in the fandom~