ImageMagick - maximal number of frames?

Question

I am using ImageMagick to convert sequence of png files to an animated gif. Basically the command is

convert -delay 5 img/gif_part_*.png animation.gif

The files go from gif_part_1.png to gif_part_27.png, but the gif starts at gif_part_10.png(maybe 9) and goes to the last. You can see it here. Stack won't allow me to upload the gif file, so I'll edit it later.

So is there a restriction on the number of files I can make into a gif (now it looks like the maximum is about 18)? I am working on turtle graphics and I want to show the process when the graphics is created by recursive function. The number of png files might be hundred or more.

I have also tried using ffmpeg but could not make it working.

Update

I have tried making a gif out of two smaller gifs, and it done the job. But it is horrible way I think - that would be so much of a work, putting it all together.

I think the problem might be in naming the files. I have read somewhere, that adding zero might be necessary, since gif_part_10.png might come before gif_part_1.png.

You are correct, when I had a project like this I numbered my frames from `frame_000.png` to `frame_108.png` and it worked perfectly from there. — Niet the Dark Absol, Jun 09 '14 at 15:21
@NiettheDarkAbsol Yes, it is working now! Great, but now I am not sure whether I should delete it, or edit the Q or answer it..:) — quapka, Jun 09 '14 at 15:28
It looks like you came back and edited about a half hour after you posted. In a case like this, I figure it'd be okay if you answered your own question :) — Niet the Dark Absol, Jun 09 '14 at 15:34

score 2 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 12:25

Basically the solution is in my updated question. But for better readability I will add an answer. The problem was in naming individual png files. When ImageMagick-command convert creates a gif file it needs to sort the png files somehow. The wrong naming would be

img1.png
img2.png
.
img10.png
.
.
img90.png

Because convert would in this case put img10.png before img1.png, which most certainly ruins the output. The correct way is this:

img01.png
img02.png
img03.png
img04.png
img05.png
img06.png
img07.png
img08.png
img09.png
img10.png
.
.
.
img90.png

Now convert will sort the files in correct order

Since I have been creating the png files on my own I could easily correct the script, thanks to this neat approach. I assume you know, how much pictures you want to convert into a gif, lets put it into variable `num_images' then you can do:

path  = 'img_'+ str(index + 1).zfill( len( str( num_images) ) )
path += '.png'

Which will add the necessary amount of leading zeros. E.g. you have 236 images to convert (that is in our case num_images = 236). Another neat trick is len( str( num_images ) ). First it creates a string from 236 --> '236' and then it finds the length of len( '236' ) = 3

This is how the final files will look like zfill:

img_001.png
img_002.png
.
.
.
img_010.png
img_011.png
.
.
img_100.png
.
.
.
img_236.png

ImageMagick - maximal number of frames?

1 Answers1