After Effects CC doesn't support native GIF export, but we can use Photoshop or Adobe Media Encoder to create GIFs.

Create a GIF with After Effects and Adobe Media Encoder (AME)

Add your composition as a source in AME

1. In After Effects CC, open your composition.
2. Go to File → Export → Add to Adobe Media Encoder Queue...
3. Adobe Media Encoder will open with the composition as a source.

<aside> 💡 Already exported a video and want to convert to GIF? Launch Adobe Media Encoder by itself and go to File → Add Source (⌘I / Ctrl + I) ****to import your video.

</aside>

Change the export settings

1. In the queue, go to whatever is in the Format field of your source (in the screenshot below, it's H.264) to open the Export Settings.

   

2. In Export Settings dialog, go to the Format dropdown menu and select Animated GIF.

   

   Adjust these variables to balance quality and size:

   

   • Quality: How lossy or compressed the final output will be from 0 - 100.

   • Width/Height: The lower the resolution, the smaller the file size.

   • Frame Rate: Frames per second in your GIF. Reduce for smaller file size.

     <aside> 💡 The default export settings will match the composition, which can result in a really big file size. GIF is an old file format and best used with limited colors and resolution.

     </aside>

3. Go to the Start Queue button ( return ) to render your GIF. ****

   

Create a GIF with Adobe Photoshop

To use this method, you'll need to export a video from Afters Effects, then import it into Photoshop. See Cinema 4D Lite export guide for instructions for exporting a video from After Effects.

1. In Photoshop, go to File > Import > Video Frames to Layers. A dialog will open.

   

2. In the Import Video To Layers dialog, choose a range to import:

   <aside> ⚠️ Long videos will affect Photoshop's CPU usage and may slow down performance.

   </aside>

   • From Beginning to End: Choose if you want to make a GIF out of the entire video.

   • Selected Range Only: Choose if you want to make a GIF from a clip of the video. Use the in and out points on the player to select the clip.

   • Limit To Every n Frames: Choose if your animation is long to reduce the file size. Use  to only import every other frame. Will result in a faster animation.

     1

   • Make Frame Animation: Import the video as frame-by-frame animation instead of a video layer.

     Click OK to import.

3. Go to File > Export > Save for Web (Legacy)... ( ****⌥⇧⌘S / Alt + Shift + Ctrl + S ) ****to open the Save for Web dialog.

   

   Adjust these settings to balance quality and file size:

   • Lossy is a value between 0 - 100 that determines how compressed the final output will be.
   • Image Size can be adjusted to further reduce file size.
   • Quality settings are different presets that will affect the size and image quality of the GIF.
   • Looping Options determines whether your GIF will loop forever or play through once.

4. When you're done, click Save... to export your GIF.