Safari corrupt transparency in animated GIFs

Question

Safari corrupt transparency in animated GIFs

I am running Safari 4.0.4 under Snow Leopard 10.6.2 on an iMac (mid-2007) and am having issues with animated gifs on websites displaying with fringes of mis-coloured pixels where they should be transparent.

Annoyingly, the issues are intermittent. I can find a bad GIF, see mis-coloured pixels, refresh the cache and sometimes it will be fine, sometimes it will show mis-coloured pixels again but in different places and colours.

Here are two screenshots of the issue. I have cropped the GIF, zoomed it 200% and saved it static for you to see the problem.

Example 1 : http://www.dcoffey.co.uk/images/BadGif1.jpg

This was supposed to be an animated GIF of the Scottish flag and about every 2s (which is the length of the animation), the border of mis-coloured pixels flashes off then back again.

Example 2 : http://www.dcoffey.co.uk/images/BadGif2.jpg

This was a snapshot of an animated GIF from DeviantART. The original is here : http://TheUncle2k.deviantart.com/art/glomppoke-146127118

When I save the GIF to Desktop and view the individual frames in Preview, they all look perfect but if I hold the cursor down and let it flick through them all, I get the corruption appearing occasionally (Example 2 original shows it on the second frame of the original).

Any clues?

iMac mid-2007 4Gb, Mac OS X (10.6.2), Safari 4.0.4

Posted on Jan 26, 2010 9:43 AM

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Answer 1

Jan 26, 2010 12:04 PM in response to Daniel Coffey

HI Daniel,

Run the Apple Hardware Test from your iMac install disc to make sure it's not a video or graphics card problem.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1509

If everything is ok there boot from your install disc and run Disk Utility to make sure there aren't any errors on the the startup disk.

Insert your install disk and Restart, holding down the "C" key until grey Apple appears.
Go to Installer menu and launch Disk Utility.
Select your HDD (manufacturer ID) in the left panel.
Select First Aid in the Main panel.
*(Check S.M.A.R.T Status of HDD at the bottom of right panel. It should say: Verified)*
Click Repair Disk on the bottom right.
If DU reports disk does not need repairs quit DU and restart.
If DU reports errors Repair again and again until DU reports disk is repaired.
When you are finished with DU, from the Menu Bar, select Utilities/Startup Manager.
Select your start up disk and click Restart

While you have the Disk Utility window open, look at the bottom of the window. Where you see Capacity and Available. *Make sure there is always 10% to 15% free disk space*

From the Safari Menu Bar, click Safari / Reset Safari. Select the top 5 buttons and click Reset.

Go here for trouble shooting 3rd party plugins or input managers which might be causing the problem.

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1594

Make sure Safari is running in 32-bit mode. Right or control click the Safari icon in the Applications folder, then click: Get Info In the Get Info window click the black disclosure triangle next to General so it faces down. Select 32 bit mode. Also, (in that same window) make sure Safari is NOT running in Rosetta.

Carolyn 🙂

Message was edited by: Carolyn Samit

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Answer 2

Jan 27, 2010 4:29 AM in response to Carolyn Samit

Hello Carolyn - thanks for the extensive reply and here is what I have attempted so far...

1. Apple Hardware Test - I ran the AHT v3A141 which came with the iMac and it passed all tests (phew!)

2. Disk Utility - no errors and I am only using 26Gb of my 500Gb

3. Reset Safari - done and makes no change to the edges of the animated gifs

4. Third Party Plugins - even with all third party plugins disabled and a restart I still get the gif corruption. The plugins that are listed when I permit them to load are...

Flip4Mac Windows Media Plugin 2.3
Flip4Mac Windows Media Web Plugin 2.3
DivX Web Player 2.0.0.263
Silverlight 3.0.40818.0 (no idea what this is)
Shockwave Flash 10.0 r42
Wacom Tablet Plugin
Wacom Pressure Plugin
Java Plugin for Cocoa
iPhotoPhotocast iPhoto6
QuickTime plugin 7.6.3
Quartz Composer plugin (no idea what this is)

5. Input Managers - Safari AdBlock - disabling this makes no difference either and I usually run with it off anyway.

6. Safari 32-bit - no change here either when I force Safari to run in 32-bit mode. Rosetta was not selected.

So... I am stumped. It is a very minor fault but an irritating one. It has been happening for quite some time and I have kept trying to ignore it. It is only visible on some animated gifs viewed through Safari although using Preview to rapidly move between frames of a gif does occasionally show a similar effect.

Do you want me to obtain the source of some GIFs that exhibit this effect? Anything else you can suggest for me to look at? Maybe view an affected GIF in some other animated GIF viewer?

Thanks,

Daniel.

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Answer 3

Jan 28, 2010 4:23 PM in response to Daniel Coffey

I am having this issue as well. It's easily seen on the gif linked to by Daniel. I'm using Safari 4.0.3 on Windows Vista x64.

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