Anyone know good gif compressor?

[jinspin]

My animated gifs are running around 30K for 400x100 banner in Xtreme.
If I make background transparent option then size easily doubles.

Is there any gif compressors that reduce the size a bit?

Thanks

[a4hire]

You can get some compression in Xtreme by reducing the amount of colors used.

[gwpriester]

If possible try to export at 16 colors. This will give you a much smaller file size than the very same image exported at 256 colors. It has to do with the amount of bits of information per pixel.

As Bruce has suggested, at 256 colors you can experiment with fewer colors. Change the number of colors to 128 ans press Preview to see how much smaller the file size is.

Depending upon the number of colors and whether or not you have any gradients, you can often get by with 24-64 colors and if you have gradients, use the Error Diffusion Dithering option.

Finally, 8-bit PNG files are often smaller than GIF files which is also 8-bit (256 colors).

Gary

[jinspin]

Thanks a bunch!

I had upped the colors to 128 because I have gradient in my banner and you could start seeing the lines with fewer colors. I will try a lower number with error diffusion set and see how that impacts the gradient. Cool!

[Intbel]

Transparent gifs will always be larger than non-transparent gifs.
If you make the gif's background the same as your webpage's backgound this will reduce the size while making it appear transparent to the viewer.

[sallybode]

.Png transparency is not yet supported by Internet Explorer. Don't know why.