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Most of the Banner Ads built by the Mynet team are
animated and we use the same principles as cartoonist use when making your favorite
intellectual viewing, such as "Cow & Chicken" or classics like the Simpson's
and Beavis & Butthead and other highly recommended programs.
Steps to use when designing a Banner Ad
 | Think about what you want to achieve with the Banner and consider at least some of
the following: size, location, purpose, finished file size and the time to download, the
number of repetitions on the site, colour, methods to be used for animating and the
overall goal to achieve with the banner advertisement etc.
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| Once the concept is developed the next object is to produce a background, and you
can visit many sites "on line" and purchase backgrounds, or if you can right
click mouse and save the background of the site you visiting. However if the background or
site is copyright then of course you will check with the authors to gain permission.
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| With the background (which doesn't conflict with the surrounding area) in place the
next thing is to decide how your animation will operate, and how to produce a seamless
animation sequence. There are several very good animation programmes which can be
purchased for several hundred dollars, but due to the cost they are generally used by
professional web designers. We have several different programmes we use for animations
(depending on the clients/banner requirements). The easiest method is to build frame by
frame cartoon, and make minor alterations to each frame to give the impression of the
object moving.
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| The important thing about making this type of animation is to keep the foreground
and background split or skinned. Once you have made your minor changes with different
skins then you need a programme to join your animation together. The Warehouse
occasionally has CD Roms with animation programmes or you can purchase from your local
bookshop Computer Magazines that have Shareware or trial time locked programme, which is a
good method to use to learn about animations.
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| If everything has been built in the same place, and saved so that overlaps do not
occur you should be able to produce a fairly interesting animated gif. The gif on the
right has a slight wobble in frames 5 & 6 so you can see the problems that occur with
wrong placement. The left animation demonstrates problems associated with skins not being
used between each gif (to block out the previous picture).
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Example of problems
encountered with poor animation skills. |
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Example of better use of skins and frame
rates. |
| When animated gif (graphics) are built they can take some time with the design and
development to ensure that file size, animation, sequences and backgrounds are kept to an
acceptable level without gaining file size and still look reasonable throughout the
animation.
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The My Net team have learnt their lessons on how to
develop animated gif which is why we charge development fees (at very reasonable rates) as
we design your Banners.
If you require us to build you an animated gif please
email us or fill out the
information request form.
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This is another example of an animated
gif, which will return you to the New Zealand Trades Directory home page - one reason its
displayed on the base of a page is that it has a massive file size - 60kb which is
hopefully downloading while you have been reading the information above. Remember -
once your animated gif exceeds 15kb you have to seriously think of other methods to use -
i.e. Fireworks™ |
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