How to Animate a Graphic Novel Page

Animated Graphic Novel Page by Chris Olson

I created this animated graphic novel page using the Procreate app and Photoshop. I created each panel individually in Procreate and then combined them in Photoshop. I used the timeline function in Photoshop to create the animated gif.

In order to make the gif animation work you need to put each element in the panel on a separate layer. For example in the middle panel a boat appears to be moving in the ocean. To begin I created four layers. I put the boat on one layer and the waves on three layers. The motion is created by adding duplicate layers for each of the elements that appear to be moving. In this panel the waves and the boat are moving. So I created duplicates of the moving wave layer and the boat layer. Each of the duplicates moves slightly in their position in the panel. You can include this motion using the animation timeline in Photoshop.

Telling stories with motion graphics is fun and is a great way to add a interesting element to a graphic novel page.