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Re: GIF preview broken - temp workaround

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Markus_Wernig
8 - Airtable Astronomer
8 - Airtable Astronomer

I have seen this question remain unanswered twice (@Jeremy_Oglesby @Benoit_Champy) - and I think I found a workaround what I think is either a “bug” or an “oversight” by the Airtable team.

Some animated GIF images cannot be displayed. Airtiable gives us this error message:

Screen Shot 2020-08-11 at 10.48.31 AM

I found that if a GIF contains an Alpha Channel, Airtable won’t display it.

Screen Shot 2020-08-11 at 10.42.59 AM

night sky

If there is no Alpha Channel, the preview works. Now the question is, how do you create GIFs without an Alpha Channel? My simple os X app won’t allow me to ditch it. A ton of GIFs you find on the web have Alpha Channel on by default, even though it’s not being used (and please excuse my typos on the file names… :winking_face: )

UPDATE: I got a small “Alpha on” GIF to work. So what I wrote above is not a workaround.

4 Replies 4

Great discovery on that issue! This seems to me like it’s a bug in Airtable. I would report it to support@airtable.com, and hopefully they can fix it.

Oh, to answer your other question: You can open up GIFs in Apple’s Preview app, and then choose to “export” the GIF or choose “Save As…” for the GIF. Either way, the save dialog box will give you the ability to uncheck the alpha option.

Excellent. Thanks for the “Alpha Off” tip, Scott. I also sent the Airtable support team a message.

Markus_Wernig
8 - Airtable Astronomer
8 - Airtable Astronomer

My findings were incorrect. I may be file size. Some GIFs work, other don’t. It’s a mystery.

Airtable says all GIFs should work. So it’s a bug and they’re investigating.