What I love the most about GSAP?

[katerlouis]

There is this big, big tree.

Uuuuh, that's high. I always wanted to climb it. Can I?

First touch. The peeling is thick, and itchy, but warm and inspiring confidence.

I lay my arms around it, starting to rub up.

Hmm? Aaha– Okay– That's how– Nice! 

It's working. That's all I wanted. No need to leave this robust stem.

But wait. What's that? There's a branch! And another? I'm curious–

The more I climb this tree –body pressed tight onto it– the fear of these little branches slowly fades. 

I finally, gently step on one. Sometimes they crackle, but never break!

My tight grip loosens up; Cheeks stop scratching as I lift my head–

Oh boy! So many branches. And look how high I am!

Wait what? There's a bird! And anoter one? 

I start talking to the birds. More birds.

I felt like a king just walking the branches.

The birds taught me how to jump on them!

And soon I'll fly. Soon.

 

 

I have never experienced anything similar. 

Such an easy entrance, .. well .. once you accept the word Tween as a thingy describing an animation

One can work with GSAP without knowing anything more but .to, .set,  and .from.

Easy to learn, hard to master.

You decide how far you go. 

 

When you are part of this special breed of developers/designers, be careful!

Because GSAP will suck you in, won't let loose and change the way you see and work the web.

 

That's what I love most.

Thank you guys for that.

 

 

 

 

4 hour research until 1:30am in my freetime, and still burning so much inside that I had to write this.

That's how awesome GSAP is.

[GreenSock]

You get the award for the most unique, poetic post in the forums, possibly ever

 

I really appreciate the kind words and enthusiasm!

 

Sometimes we struggle with how to best explain to the uninitiated why they should at least try GSAP. Lists of features can be overwhelming or dull. Comparing it to other technologies can come across as critical or arrogant. Hearing stories like yours makes me want to tap into that experience and unearth what REALLY matters...what's compelling? Now that you've gotten past that initial hurdle with positive results, what would you say to that pre-GSAP version of you? What do you see now that you wish you saw before? 

 

@PointC told a really nice story of his experience as well. He has come such a long way and inspires a lot of people today (along with Blake, Jonathan, Rodrigo, Dipscom, Diaco, Carl, and others). 

 

Lately I've realized that it's more about a feeling...a feeling of confidence that whatever the client throws at you, whatever you're tasked with, you can rest assured that there's probably a way with GSAP and it won't be too arduous. At least I hope that's true. 

 

Anyway, thanks again for taking the time to share the encouragement. 

[katerlouis]

I would tell my pre-GSAP, .. wait.. I will, when you guys implement timetraveling in GSAP 3000!

 

I will tell him:

You stupid prick! Stop wasting your time on weighing transitions over @keyframes, you already know this will never satisfy you, no matter how many tutorials of awesome css-animation systems you read; auto-facebook-block everyone that gives you Edge Animate code; just ignore that it feels like tween is word you need to study to understand and watch this 90 second video.

 

But seriously, "marketing wise" you guys definitely went in the right direction with the recent page updates.

 

What I personally would focus the most on:

 

1.

Bust a 10 second live code example in everyones faces. Spreading the part of the 90second video, that just codes and plays with the timeline. The good readability and therefore maintainability of TimelineMax is the most impressive and therefore biggest reason to jump into the pool. I see why the 90sec vid has to do "all browsers!" "no bugs!" "awesome sh**!"; but honestly: when I watch it I still think in the back of my head "yeah okay, everybody promises that, come to the point, lady" – 

 

You integrate super impressive examples everywhere in the page. They intimidated me. They absolutely don't feel like "this is super easy", and well, these examples just aren't easy. They are relatively easy compared to other methods; still not easy, though. But it is possible to get there. The code of these animations is not a claustrophobic, complicated, sensitive, dark glowing web, that is super hard to unravel. It is more of a brick-by-brick situation. Not much backtracking/back and forth, mostly straight forward, linear, step by step; *out of expressions*.

 

My suggestion would be to feature simplified code making these examples and tie them closer together; the page should more create a feeling of "Hoh? That's it? I could do this;" for newcomers. 

After all, the way I see it, you don't sell results, you sell a uniquely powerful, intuitive and maintainable way of getting there.

 

2.

Second biggest strength of GSAP is this very forum, the community. I don't know how you guys did it, but getting an answer to a question, quite often a very urgent one, happens insanely quick on this platform. No matter how "dumb" or "trivial" the question seems, I have not experienced anything but very good will to help get the result I want. No bending of the intent to fit into a solution; no trolling or poison like "dude, again the force3D question? Use the search, for Jake's sake!" – There's a vibe of calm acceptance of different skill-levels and a each-one-teach-one mentality here. 

On top of all that the answers are compact AND understandable, 90% on-dead-center solutions. Pure quality.

 

I don't know how to communicate this to the outside world, but I'm assured if people would know that this is way different from an "usual forum experience"; that you get encouraged to ask your question and you will get hugged, padded and helped; that you can learn very quickly by just browsing and reading the threads; that you can teach even Blake a thing; than we have people streaming in like Web-Woodstock.

 

"Join Web-Woodstock, get high on awesome sh**!"

 

 

PS: "Uninitiated", I like 8) – How about Unkindled? Or Muggle!

[katerlouis]

No joke, just read Craigs story for the first time.

Funny how we describe so many things almost identically. 

Funny how I now feel stupid now effectively repeating what he already said. :[ 

I didn't crib, Mommy! 

[Dipscom]

MWAAHAHAHAAH!

 

You have been converted! You are now one of US!

 

No escape.

 

[PointC]

That’s okay @kreativzirkel, I don’t think you copied off my test. I think many of our learning journeys have similar paths so your poetry is like my story. We all start off being intimidated and/or feeling stupid for asking something that is probably simple to an experienced GreenSocker.

 

When you first start the learning process you simply don’t know what you don’t know so understanding how GSAP can make your work easier and more fun can certainly be tricky. It also makes asking questions somewhat more difficult because you’re not even sure how to phrase your query. Asking that first question in the forum is the biggest hurdle in my opinion. Once you get past that initial fear, you’ll be hooked.

 

That’s why I think the GS forum is such a unique place. It’s most definitely a great place to get answers, but it’s also a fun place to hang out and participate in the conversation. Where else can you find an online community of talented people without the usual interweb snarkiness? The forum is one of GreenSock’s strongest promotional features IMHO.

 

I can honestly say had I not started participating around here I’d still be stuck copying and pasting code that I barely understood. Helping others has been the best learning experience I could have imagined.

 

I sometimes look at the number of Guests that are active on the forum and wonder if/when they’ll join the conversation. I lurked for a long time, but that moment to jump in came along for me and it will happen for everyone else when it feels right for them. 

 

Of course, you now get CustomEase just for registering in the forum. You don’t even have muster the courage to ask your first question.

 

I hope everyone reading this knows that we’re here to help and we’d love to have you as part of the GreenSock community.

 

Happy tweening.

 

PS I completely agree with  @Dipscom. You are now one of us. There is no escape. 
 

[GreenSock]

Good feedback, @kreativzirkel. It sounds like the speed/compatibility claims don't matter much to folks like you and it's more about the developer ergonomics of the API. 

 

@Carl is actually working on a video that I'll make that point really well (in my opinion). It's not a 30-second teaser or anything, but it takes some time to illustrate concepts that could be game-changers for a lot of people workflow-wise. Keep an eye out for that (likely several weeks out at least, realistically). 

 

I couldn't agree more that one of the biggest things GSAP has going for it is the community around here. I'm so proud of the caliber of people that hang around here and dish out advice. @kreativzirkel I wouldn't be surprised if we fast-forward 6 months, you'll have a similar story to Craig's (@PointC) and you'll be dishing out advice to others daily. It's a fun challenge.