It started as a small personal test just to try out a setup in After Effects, and quickly grew way beyond anything I expected.
Here are my Gastaloops: a 100-day daily project, creating and posting one seamless looping animated GIF every single day.
Gastaloops
A 100-day looping GIF project
01. Concept
Browsing the internet, I kept seeing artists and designers who managed to keep themselves busy with daily personal projects, posting something new every single day.
Looking at them, I always thought I could never pull it off: too busy with my day job in the studio, too busy at home with my family. But I decided to try anyway. I just had to work against the clock.
02. Limits
To fuel creativity and avoid blank-page paralysis, I set strict rules from day one. Playing inside tight boundaries always relaxes me and lets me focus on the idea.
- Three colours only: An off-white, a coral red, and pure black, using RGB values easy enough to type from memory every night:
R255 G230 B255,R255 G100 B100, andR0 G0 B0. - Resolution:
800×600, optimised for Dribbble. - Duration: Exactly 50 frames in a seamless loop, finished in roughly one hour.
03. Freedom
With all the technical limits locked in, I needed one final rule that would keep me from ever getting stuck: no rules at all about tools or style.
Every loop could be made in Cinema 4D, After Effects, Photoshop, Houdini, RealFlow, hand-drawn frame by frame, or shot on camera. A tool is just a tool, and stepping outside your comfort zone is half the fun when you only have an hour on the clock.
04. Impact & Press
Making these loops was an unforgettable ride. Even now, I can look at any single GIF in the grid below and remember exactly where I was and what happened that day.
Posted daily across Dribbble, Imgur, Twitter, and Giphy, the series passed over a million views on Imgur alone and was featured across international design press:
Fubiz · Dribbble Timeout · Creative Boom · Wired Italia · La Repubblica · Inspiration Grid · We and the Color · GIF Magazine · Giphy Featured Artist
05. Music Video & Awards
After finishing the 100th loop, I edited the collection together into an official music video for Out by IISO, which premiered on Wired and went on to tour international animation festivals.
- Vimeo Staff Pick (February 2017)
- Winner · FILE GIF 2017: Multiplicity, São Paulo
- Winner · Creativepool Annual 2017 (Best Animation / Individual)
- Winner · Art Short Festival 2017 (Best Music Video)
- 3rd Place · The Gifers Festival, Turin
- Featured in the ARTE documentary Court-circuit: Les GIFs et la culture du Net and screened at over 25 international film festivals (full list →).
The Complete Collection
All 100 original daily loops (plus 9 bonus loops added along the way), playing in their original 800×600 50-frame glory.
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If you made it all the way to the bottom of all 109 loops, good fortune will come to you. You’re amazing!