GIMPing a GIF

[Mainframeguy]

well I am really, really unskilled/experienced in this field - but recently just for the heck of it was playing around with GIMP and decided to have a go at making a ground, flattening it, then having text "unfurl" in what has gotta be the simplest way to try to make an animation. GIMP supports this and I am following this tutorial.

Problem is I am really struggling with step two - I want to add coloured text and every time I do so it seems to go monochrome. Either that or somehow is not adding it to the frame, but to the underlying "alpha"? I must be missing something major - I do not get the "floating" frame.

I've had numerous faltering steps - like realising the opacity setting on the frames was darkening everything. I've spent a few hours on this and thought I would ask some "experts" or more experienced folks here to give their input or point me to other tutorials that may get me going.

Is it like this with all creative work? Or do you reach a point in the learning curve where things flow more easily? I'll be persisting anyways - and no doubt something may crop up by way of signature at some time....

 

[lshadoff]

Problem is I am really struggling with step two - I want to add coloured text and every time I do so it seems to go monochrome. Either that or somehow is not adding it to the frame, but to the underlying "alpha"? I must be missing something major - I do not get the "floating" frame.

You must set all the text attributes before you enter the text.

To create colored text in GIMP:
1 - Choose the Text tool.
2 - At the bottom of the Tools panel there is now a black bar.
3 - Click on this and a panel will open with a color palette.
4 - Click/drag on the palette until you get the color you want for the text.
5 - Close the panel.
6 - Make sure the bar is now the desired color.
7 - Choose the font, size, and style.
8 - Click on your image where you want the text to display.
9 - A panel will open for you to enter the text.
10 - Enter the text and close the panel.
11 - Voila! The text appears on the image with all the attributes you set.

Lew