Gif Creator - Create gifs directly inside Unity!

Gif Creator
Create gifs directly inside Unity!
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Gif Creator allows you to record a gif from one camera, or the entire screen, directly inside Unity.

Features
- Preview gif before saving it,
- Select only the frames you want,
- Define your parameters (frames per seconds, duration, record width...),
- Record the entire screen, or a specific smaller part,
- Record for x seconds, or always record the last x seconds,
- Save gifs to folder, or upload to imgur.com!
- Works on the Unity Editor for Windows and Mac,
- Clean and easy to use Editor Window.

Links
- Available on the Asset Store,
- Website with full documentation, examples and FAQ.

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I. Want. This.

Looks so good! Curious though, will I be able to both save to my computer and upload to Imgur? Cause, yaknow, that'd be rad.

 

Hey!

Thanks a lot! I can't wait for it to be approved
And yes of course, you can both save and upload to imgur!
As you can see in the screenshots and the video, there is a save and an upload button

 

Ah, my mistake I didn't watch the video - had incorrectly assumed that you'd destroy the image once saved/uploaded, but clearly you can do both actions.
Looks great!

 

Hello everyone.
Just a message to let you know that Unity has approved Gif Creator.
It's available now on the AssetStore!

http://u3d.as/icC

Have a great day

 

I love this and it works super easy! Are there any plans on enabling recording without the need to have Play-mode enabled?

 

Thanks
Will add this to the list of features and see if I can manage to do it!

 

can this work also in stand alone ? (so player can record animated gif)

 

Hey there!
Right now it's not possible to do that, because it's an Editor tool, but in a future update I'll add support for this, so yes

 

An update is available on the Asset Store.

Version 1.0.5
- FIX Inverted image on Unity Editor Windows
- FIX Weird preview texture on Unity Editor Windows
- NEW Added duration info in the preview section
- NEW Added a toggle to open the exported gif folder after saving is done

 

Looks like a great tool, as always!

 

Ahah thanks a lot!
PS: Nice new avatar!

 

Haha thanks. I personally dont like it, will update soon hopefully. Keep up the good work on your plugins!

 

An update is available on the Asset Store.

Version 1.0.6
- NEW: Added a 'Record Upside Down' toggle, when using the 'Record single camera' mode (if you still have issues with upside down recording).

 

An really minor update is available on the Asset Store.

Version 1.0.7
- FIX: Every script is now in the PygmyMonkey.GifCreator namespace.

 

Does this work on iOS Android

 

Hey there!

It's an editor only tool for now, so no runtime.
It should be "working" at runtime though but I have to provide an API for that and make some tests etc... which is not planned for now. Sorry.

 

Was wondering since you mentioned on the reddit post that it's supported on iOS/Android

For mobile, it may make sense to just wrap an existing performant plugin

 

Hey there!

On reddit I said :
"In a future update, I plan to make it possible to record gifs at runtime, so players could record a part of their game and share it. It should work on all platforms (Android, iOS, Mac, Windows...),"
So it's not there yet

Also Gif Creator is based on Moments that already support recording gifs on iOS/Android.
The only reason it's not in Gif Creator yet, is because I want to really test it and make sure it's working great with a good API before "enabling" it. But I don't have a lot of time right now :/

 

Does it support full quality gifs ? (Without artifacts or color changes etc)

 

Yes it should.
In the export section, before saving your gif, simply set "Compression Quality" to the lowest value (1).
And make sure the record width in the "Parameters" section is set to your GameView width.

 

Hey Pygmy Monkey.

I just bought your asset, and this is what I get when I try to run it:

I'm running the Unity 5.4 beta, so likely that is the problem. Do you have access to the 5.4 beta?

Any ideas??

 

bump.

 

Hey Jeff!
Sorry I couldn't reply sooner :/

Well, I'm using reflection to get the size of the GameView window, so I guess it's broken in Unity 5.4!
And no I don't have access to the beta, so I'm really sorry but that will have to wait for it to be out

 

Heyho, got a question:.
is there somewhere a filesize preview before saving? cause you know, at twitter you can only upload up to 5mb and it would be nice if you see how big the gif will be at quality X before saving. it seams that you can see it in the parameter section but not before export?

 

Hello
In the parameter section, it's the estimated memory size (RAM) that will be used to record, not the final disk size.
This is something I don't really know how to get :/
I don't know if there's a way to estimate/determinate the final file size of a gif. Sorry!

 

totally fine. was just curious looks great by the way

 

Thanks a lot

 

Ok, thanks for letting me know. Will check back after 5.4 is released.

 

Hi!
Please could you answer for support ?
I've sent an issue about my unity account last week.

ps : unity 5.4 beta is available here

 

I'm also still waiting for Unity 5.4 support... Any eta?

-Jeff

 

Email answered, sorry for the delay!

Hey Jeff! I'm having a 2 weeks vacation right now, so right after that, I'll take a look to 5.4
Sorry for the delay!

 

No prob. Thanks for the heads up.

 

Hi,

I have recorded a 7 sec gif at 1280x720 and set output to 640x450 and compression quality to 100. It is in pre-processing and i dont see a bar moving for 15 minutes (and is still in 00%), is this normal for these settings ? Also how long in general can it take for a medium range PC ?

EDIT: Also i exited play mode and seems it stopped. Should i remain in play mode until the system finishes ? I got a warning "Attempting to flush memory during the pre-processing step" when i exited play mode.

EDIT2: Seems when i set resolution lower in source (exactly at output one) and compression to 30% works ok, so probably i went overboard with settings . Great system, thanks for the easy way to grab gifs !!!

Thanks

 

Left a review, super cool tool

 

Hello!

Sorry I took so much time to answer, I was in vacation...
The only thing I can see for you problem, is that as you said, you should NOT leave play mode until you have fully finished your gif and exported it. So retry with the first settings you said and it should work

PS: Thanks a lot for the review!

 

Thanks, it worked great with little teaking and the system is really super helpful and easy to use

Great job

 

I've just fixed the issues with 5.4 and sent the version to Unity. Now we just need to wait for it to be approved

 

Excellent. Thanks!

 

I got the update, but there is one small problem.

The namespaces in GUIUtils.cs and PMUtils.cs interfere with those from your other asset: ColorPalette

Once I Updated Gif Creator, Color Pallet throws errors becuase the namespace in these classes gets updated from:

PygmyMonkey.ColorPalette.Utils

to

PygmyMonkey.GifCreator.Utils

I think it should just be

PygmyMonkey.Utils

-Jeff

 

Hey Jeff! Thanks for this!
The only issue there is, is that both PMUtils.cs.meta and GUIUtils.cs.meta from the 2 packages have the same GUID.
I'm fixing that and resubmit! Sorry.

PS: I've updated ColorPalette and it's live on the Asset Store to update! (the version is still 1.1.7)

 

Hi,

One request, it would be great if for later versions there is an option to remaster a gif to lower resolution. So we can have a master HD gif and smaller ones as needed for forums etc

The easiest way would be to enable a dynamic resolution upon save (for example a downscale option) so we can save multiple times, with 1:1 and other ratios before Reset the gif.

Thanks again for the great tool, it is extremely stable too

 

Hey there!

Thanks a lot for the kind words
Hum... I think what you want to do is already possible with the current version.

Just record your gif at the max resolution you need (let's take a record width of 500 for example), then look at the last section called "Export", here you can define the output width, you'll first set it to 500, press Save, then set it to 250 and hit save again etc...

This should do it!

 

Great, i have missed this option, super cool

 

nice tool!
sadly there are some things i dont like:
- if you stop the game, your recorded gif is lost. happend to me several times
- export takes really long -280 frames around half a minute? is there an way to optimize that?
- is there a keyboard shortcut for recording and stop recording?

 

- Record lost if game stopped
Well yes, this is everything but ideal... but it's because Unity serialize everything when entering play/stop mode... But I guess I could save the entire state of the gif etc... It's just not done yet

- Export time
Yes I know, it's the gif library that I'm using that is like that, I'm not sure you can really reduce the time it takes...
The only way you can do that, is by increasing the "Compression Quality" slider (bigger values means lowest compression), and it will speed the export time, but reduce quality.

- Keyboard shortcut
No there is not, and I should add it, but I don't really have time nowadays to do that :/
I'll add it to the feature list anyway

 

Hi, Gif creator seems like a great idea and the implementation is also great - though there are some things to make smoother. For example the Canvas screen space (Overlay vs Camera), which is required for fast gif rendering.

I have many canvases and can't be bothered to set them manually temporally from Overlay to Screen rendermode. So I created a small script which does it in editor. It works simply by enabling the script and disabling return canvases to normal rendermode. Maybe Gif creator could at something like this to make the workflow smoother?

My simple helper code:

Code (CSharp):

1. using UnityEngine;
2. using System.Collections;
3.  
4. public class GifCreatorHelper : MonoBehaviour {
5.     public Canvas[] Canvases;
6.     public Camera overlayCamera;
7.  
8.     public RenderMode renderModeNormal = RenderMode.ScreenSpaceOverlay;
9.     public RenderMode renderModeOverridden = RenderMode.ScreenSpaceCamera;
10.     public float planeDistance = 0.01f;
11.  
12.  
13.     // We can activate this by simply enabling/disabling the script in editor runtime.
14.     void OnEnable(){
15.         Canvases = FindObjectsOfType(typeof(Canvas)) as Canvas[];
16.         overlayCamera = Camera.main;
17.  
18.         if(Canvases != null && Canvases.Length > 0){
19.             foreach(Canvas canvas in Canvases){
20.                 canvas.renderMode = renderModeOverridden;
21.                 canvas.worldCamera = overlayCamera;
22.                 canvas.planeDistance = planeDistance;
23.             }
24.         }
25.     }
26.  
27.  
28.     void OnDisable(){
29.         // Return old value (for now just assume all are "Screen space - Overlay",
30.         // then empty the array for clarification.
31.         if(Canvases != null && Canvases.Length > 0){
32.             foreach(Canvas canvas in Canvases){
33.                 canvas.renderMode = renderModeNormal;
34.                 // canvas.worldCamera = overlayCamera;
35.                 // canvas.sortingOrder = overlaySortingOrder;
36.             }
37.         }
38.  
39.         Canvases = null;
40.     }
41. }

PS: The camera in gif creator settings could be automatically set with Camera.main, or?
PPS: It seemed that generating a gif works in playmode, but if game is paused it stops. Or something.

 

Hey

Thanks a lot for sharing that!
But I can't really use that in Gif Creator, as this is a really custom behaviour, like, right here, you just set them back to ScreenSpaceOverlay on Disable, and maybe they weren't, and maybe this and that etc...
So the best way (I think), is to use your own custom script, exactly like you did, so you can fit exactly to your needs.

And yes, Gif Creator in the editor works only when the game is playing, if you stop it, you'll lose everything

 

True dat. I still think the script could be made safely useable in any project by for example caching all the canvas-values in an array and restoring the values OnDisable or OnWhatEverIsCalledWhenAGifRecordingEnds(). Then again, maybe there are some use cases that could still cause problems.

 

You're also more than right
But you're the very first to ask for something like that... So maybe if other people ask for it? We'll see