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| Firstly create or
open the text you want to apply this affect to. |
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next, set the colours back to
black and white by clicking on the smaller colour selection icon next to
the current colour selection and swap the FG and BG colours by clicking
on the double ended arrow in the colour box.
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now select the gradient tool
and bring up the tool options by double clicking on it's icon.
|
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| in the tool options window there
is an option called Gradient (1.2) or Shape (1.3) select Bi-Linear from
the drop down list. |
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| now bring up the layers palette
using <image> - Layers - Layers, Channels & Paths in GIMP 1.2
or <image> - Dialogues - Layers, Channels & Paths if you're using
1.3 |
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| create a new layer by clicking
on the new layer icon in the layers dialogue and set it to transparent. |
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set the layer's mode to Screen
from the drop down box
|
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| now select the gradient tool
and drag a line, similar to the one shown, although the size and angle can
vary, across the right hand side of your text. |
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| you should now have your text
with an area that looks lit, now duplicate the flash layer about 4 times
|
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now use the move 
tool to drag each copy of the layer slightly further across than the last
one, so that there is just enough of an offset between them, as shown in
the screenshot |
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Now duplicate the base layer
enough times for every copy of the effect layer to have a corresponding
base layer with one base layer left over, then arrange the layers so that
the order goes effect, base, effect.
If you know the background
colour of the page you want to use the image on you can repeat the step
but with layers of that colour below the images. |
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You should now right click
on the effect layer on the layers palette and select merge down, this
will apply the effect to the layer below, repeat until you have several
combined layers and one original left at the bottom of those layers.
The layer at the bottom will
be the first frame of the animation, and the uppermost layer the last,
it may be useful to have a copy of the original image at both the top
and bottom so that the animation loops cleanly. |
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| Now you can set
the layer timings, this will determine how long each frame is displayed
before it is replaced by the next one in the sequence, this is set in millisecond
by double clicking on a layer and adding (#ms) to the name where # is the
delay in milliseconds. Set all but the topmost frames to between 10ms and
50ms, and then set the last frame to 3500ms, this will give a long delay
before the animation loops. |
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Now you can preview the animation
by selecting <image> - filters - animation - animation playback.
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| If you're happy with the way
the animation is running you may want to optimise it before saving <image>
- filters - animation - animation optimise, this will produce a new copy
of the image with duplicate areas of the layers removed, now save the new
image with a .gif extension select save as animation, and click on export.
On the next dialogue select loop forever and click ok. |
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| You should now have an animated
GIF of your animation, ready for use on the web. |
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