First Animation Ever

Here is the first animation I’ve ever made! I made it in the spring of 2024, and the assignment was to create a GIF on top of a still image. My friend and I took this image with a disposable camera during the summer of 2023. While driving outside of Austin, we saw some cows on this side of the road, so we obviously had to park the car and say hi.

I was feeling homesick when I made this, so I knew I wanted to do something cowboy-related. The idea was that this cowboy had one too many beers and tripped over a rock when reaching for his hat that was blown away by the wind. For an added little laugh I had the hat come land back on him after he faceplants into the ground.

Here are the thumbnails I made. After this step, I took this into Photoshop and began creating each frame that would go in between these key moments. I made this GIF frame by frame, at 12fps, which was quite a learning curve for me. Overall, I am very happy with how it turned out and am excited to make more like this in the future.