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Do you know any free resource on the web (a website or a piece of downloadable software) that I could use in order to (learn how to) create .gif files (those simple images that make simple repetitive movements)?

Just google for gif converter.

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use any modern image editor.
GIMP (free)
Paint.net (free)
photoshop ($$$)
Many others (free | $$$)

if you want to convert a movie to .gif, there are many converters. I use Format Factory for converting stuffs.

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I understand you may need/want GIF, but you should also look into APNG, animated PNG.

GIF is (or was) patented & can only do 256 colors anyway...APNG is the future...

HotKeyIt, tidbit, Guest, thank you all for your answers.
Guest, thanks also for your advice.

Lot of Gif files are not animated. Although their interest, beside being available, is near null...

As said, there isn't much you need to know to make animated Gifs, you just make a bunch of images, and specify for each how many time it will be displayed (avoid going below 100ms).
A free software like Beneton Movie Gif can help a lot.

About APNG: it is a nice idea, but W3C rejected it (in favor of MNG, I think) as being a hack against the spirit of PNG, so I don't know if it is really the future, even if a number of browsers support it (but not IE, of course!).

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vPhiLho := RegExReplace("Philippe Lhoste", "^(\w{3})\w*\s+\b(\w{3})\w*$", "$1$2")

...I thought it was the other way around, MNG losing to APNG...also, I was not aware of W3C rejecting either, but I still think MNG is the one losing (if not from W3C, then losing in some other way)...I really wouldn't mind if both survive...MNG, APNG or both...but APNG is backwards compatible with PNG, so that's good...we already have PNG to stop using JPG & GIF, we just need a well supported animated GIF alternative, whatever it is...

my experience:
It's wrong... This 2 file format is old and compatible, a lot of people is still in windows 98 with a small internet connection...

JPG:
when you save a very big file ( for example: orion galaxy in 4096*3072) a jpg is smaller than a png and we do not lose quality for perceptiple human eye , depends nuances/color/palette... it's same thing for a photo if you don't want change pixel resolution. with this dimensions, a jpg is 40 times smaller than a png ( 500K vs 20M )... jpg is perfect for commun big picture and file transfert.

GIF:
A gif is smaller than a png for very small size ( like icon ) but it's very specific and we need to manage color for customize it, it's perfect for "pixel art" and animation, however a png at this size is very good too...

I agree with Zaelia. Gif is truly outdated, except for animations, but Jpeg is still useful. On deviantART, I give scans of my B&W drawings in PNG because it shines on line art with small number of gray levels: still small image format, and no Jpeg artefact (like seen on high contrast boundaries if compression is too high).
But Jpeg is still unbeatable to make high color images with small size.

MNG has lost the battle, indeed, even Firefox stopped to support it natively (but you can add an extension to support it). I believe they throw too much stuff in this format, trying to make it yet another video format (almost).
APNG is better supported, but not officially endorsed. And lack of support on IE, among others, is annoying.

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vPhiLho := RegExReplace("Philippe Lhoste", "^(\w{3})\w*\s+\b(\w{3})\w*$", "$1$2")

Is animation possible with Jpeg?

No

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