How to upload a moving/aminated Avatar to Hogville.

[Doug]

Credit to Chic-Hog-Oh for this question...

Hi Douglas,

I do have another question:  I tried to upload a gif file (attached) to be my avatar, but right now it just shows it as a still shot, not as the 8-second "movie" that it actually is.

How do I get my avatar to actually "loop" and continue to roll as a video, as opposed to just a still shot?

Get it resized down (use http://gifmaker.me/resizer/ or http://ezgif.com/resize or http://www.gifmagic.com/) and get the width and height to 125 pixels (do not exceed this) and then you can upload it and it will not come in as a still image.

Another option is to use an image hosting service (http://someimage.com/ for example) and use the URL to the image itself for the "Specify avatar by URL" option.

[HogScoutMaster]

Ok Douggy why arent gif's working ?

[Doug]

Power refresh (shift + F5) to re-start them. Due to Hogville's side, we're pretty aggressive on caching, so sometimes you need to force-reload the page.

[HogScoutMaster]

that doesnt make any since.  it has been working for over a year, then I go to update something on my profile and now it isnt working.

[Doug]

Okay, get specific. WHAT is not working? Do you see my bear stomping around (make SURE you power refresh before you answer this, or I'll tell you to power refresh and then answer)

[HogScoutMaster]

Do you see my bear stomping around

Bear is walking just fine, its my Avatar (gif) that isnt working.  It was working, went into profile, saved profile and then it stopped working.

[SteveInArk]

The pix that is currently loaded as your avatar is a .png file.  Not a .gif file.  PNG files are not animated.  You might find that original gif and try to reload.

And the pix you have is 180 pixels wide, so the current site restrictions might cause a problem (see post #1), even if it was a gif file.

[Doug]

Steve identified your issue. You tried to upload an animated GIF that was larger than the size requirements indicated above (and quoted below). When an image is larger than the dimensions indicated, the forum software itself will resize it down AND convert it to a PNG file.

Get it resized down (use http://gifmaker.me/resizer/ or http://ezgif.com/resize or http://www.gifmagic.com/) and get the width and height to 125 pixels (do not exceed this) and then you can upload it and it will not come in as a still image.

Follow these instructions to get the size to the dimensions above.

[HogScoutMaster]

thats crazy....I used the last gif from last time and it didnt work but I did resize it so now it works THANKS

[Doug]

If you remotely linked to it, that's why it worked. Keep in mind that as Hogville continues to grow, we have to change a few things to reduce the server workload and load times so that we can keep the site fast. Adding in more front-end web servers only does so much.