This is the beginning to my thought process of the Gif design. 

The brief asks us to create a gif using a rastor image, a vector image created in Adobe illustrator and Text. The Gif should portray a message to ourselves a year from now.

I first thought of using Harry Styles as a rastor image because I see him as a very happy personality and it would be a good reminder to smile. However I didn't connect with this concept as much I would have liked.

I then started to come up with concepts that are much more personal to me. At this time all I can think about is wanting to see and hug my mum. As we are in the middle of a pandemic and I live interstate from my family, now more than ever I'm dying to give my mum a hug. I think this message is a good reminder to not take hugging your mum for granted.

This is the first draft all done in Adobe Illustrator just as a concept draft. 

I used the pencil tool to make the shape of the heart and used the envelope distort tool to put the text into the heart shape. 

After the first critique, I noted that I would have the hearts moving outwards but wasn't sure if that would be enough movement so it was suggested to pulse the heart as well. This is my first attempt at creating the actual gif.

I then refined the movement and made the hearts leave the page to create a smoother  loop 

After the second critique of the GIF, there was a worry that the raster images look more like vectors and therefore I could lose marks. It was suggested to use a raster image of candy hearts instead. I decided to run with that idea which meant i had to change the colour of the text to make it flow better. Below are a few versions of the GIF as i was playing around with different colours. 

I also managed to create a smoother movement by copying and using the  'paste in place' key to get a more accurate movement. For the pulsing heart I used a technique where I copied the image from the 2nd, 3rd or 4th page to create a more cohesive movement and to make sure it wasn't seeking from side to side.