Weighing Multimedia
6B: Animated GIFs

Of course, you can use the graphics tips in Tip #6A to minimize your animated GIFs (they're just a string of static images, after all). There are, however, some special considerations when you step into the realm of moving pictures.

Optimizing Animated GIFs
On these pages, you see an animated GIF go from 21,069-Kbytes down to 4692-Kbytes. Webreference claims the secret is to use one GIF as the background, then include only the parts of the GIF that move in subsequent frames. They also recommend reducing the color palette and pixels, frame optimization, and fiddling with your options. This tutorial uses GifBuilder, but anyone can benefit from the theory.

GIF Animation Studio
Richard Koman's book suggests using several small GIFs instead of one huge one, and, if you want to be really resourceful, laying them out using an HTML table. Decrease your graphics with Debabelizer, and consider mixing static and animated images together in one animation.

[Move on to Tip 7: Frames]